The article appears to be making the mistake of assuming political spectrums to be linear or single-dimensional. They're not. As one of these "moderates" the article discusses, my disdain for American politics has nothing to do with trying to find a "middle ground" between a Democrat left and a Republican right because that entire line is way off into the "totalitarian corrupt police state" end of an at-least-two-dimensional spectrum.<p>This is why so many "nerds" swing "quasi-libertarian". Not only do they want both social <i>and</i> economic freedom (as a whole, both the Republicans and Democrats only seem to want one or the other), but they also tend to want individual freedom. They're tired of not actually having a voice because some big company like Comcast has better resources to bribe politicians. They're tired of being ordered around by basically the same people who were laughing at them and giving them wedgies back in the 80's. They swing libertarian because libertarianism is billed as the means of euthanizing the ugly, vicious beast that is the American political machine. Else, they simply give up, seeking to subvert the political system and exist beyond its reach. This is why candidates like Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul and Donald Trump are appealing to this particular demographic: because they promise to fight against the cruft instead of riding the status quo like quite literally every other goddamn politician in this country.<p>A well written article, but it's misguided if it thinks that us "nerds" are wrong for distrusting the American political system, as it seems to imply. Washington is in need of some <i>serious</i> percussive maintenance.