Americans Continue to Divorce themselves from the Legacy Parties, Independents on the Rise

From Solomon Kleinsmith at Rise of the Center:

One of the big stories of the last few years has been the millions of people declaring their independence from the two major parties, following the surge in registration during the 2008 election. The big undercurrent to that story was that voters were moving away from the Republican party at a much faster clip than the Democrats.
In short, that is reversing. With a few years in power, voters have already gotten sick of the Democrats’ excesses. From the latest Gallup poll:

Nationwide, Democrats have a 4-point party identification advantage over Republicans in 2010 (44% to 40%), down from an 8-point advantage in 2009 and a 12-point advantage in 2008.
While Democrats’ party strength fell in each of the last two years, Republicans have not gained concomitantly. Instead, the percentage of Americans who do not identify with or lean toward either political party has increased.