When you discuss social, policy, and economic issue can you speak coherently to the issue at hand, do you balance what you know with what you don't and are learning, or is your immediate reaction to speak to which political party is at fault? If the latter, you may very well be:
1) A politician. You're doing your job.
2) A political campaigner. You're doing your job.
3) A political media professional. You're doing your job.
4) Knowingly ignorant. You respond this way by gut reaction, to participate in conversation, or to instigate. But you'll probably go home and educate yourself. Or at least be honest with yourself about what you do not know.
5) Dedicated for some reason of substance.
6) Wholly ignorant and dedicated to political partisanship whether or not you understand the issue at hand. And you won't seek to learn. You my friend are blind sheep, the stuff of a political campaigner's dream. You are doing their jobs for them.
I meet way too many number 6's. If, when asked why you are a staunch supporter of a specific political party, your best answer as to why is that your parents or friends are (and they are not politicians) you may very well be a Number 6. If your blood boils and heat rises when the "other" side shares economic, policy, or social viewpoints, yet you have no real notion of the nuts and bolts that constitute the mechanics of those issues, you may very well be a Number 6.
The point is, for the common citizen, understanding the issues at hand is more important than blind commitment to any political affiliation. And it's the only way to keep politicians honest.
Even if you speak to matters to which you are uneducated (I do it all the time) go home and educate yourself later. There's the library. There's the internet. We live in the information age.
Just don't be a Number 6.
