2008 Presidential Candidates

[drunkendonkey]

Ron Paul for president

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

That video is fucking gay tbh and it is also made worse by the fact that in the Mac Vs. PC version (WITH THE SAME GUYS I MIGHT ADD), the conservative is a PC. That is fucking lame and stupid.

 

[Zephyrus]

Ok with the Iowa caucuses coming up, a bunch of you were probably thinking "what the hell's a caucus?" I had no idea too, but CNN has informed me of how ridiculous these "election games" are. And to think how much of an impact they make on the course of an election.

Iowa caucuses 101: Arcane rules have huge impact on outcome

CNN) -- The arcane rules governing Thursday's Iowa Democratic caucuses will test even the most organized campaign, but mastery of the process could launch a candidate on a path to the White House.

Most Americans are familiar with how elections work -- secret ballots, an 18-year-old age requirement, all-day voting. But that's not how the Iowa Democratic caucuses on Thursday will work.

When the Democratic caucuses begin at 7 p.m. CT sharp in school gymnasiums, libraries, churches, farm houses and other locations in the 1,781 precincts across the Hawkeye state, step one will be to stand up and be counted.

"What you'll do is get up out of your seat and you'll go walk to the corner or space by the wall designated for the candidate of your choice," Chelsea Waliser, an organizer for Sen. Barack Obama, told potential caucus go-ers during a recent Obama rehearsal caucus. Interactive: A step-by-step look at how the caucuses work »

After this first step, party officials will determine if a candidate meets the 15 percent "threshold" requirement.

Supporters of candidates making up less than 15 percent of the vote in a particular precinct will have the option of making their vote count by voting in the second tally for a "viable" candidate -- one that got at least 15 percent of the vote on the first tally.

It is particularly interesting to watch what happens between the first and second tallies at the Iowa Democratic caucuses, as viable candidate camps vie for the votes of the unviable. It's one of the few times in American politics where voters directly interact with each other.

During the "persuasion" time in between tallies, the precinct captain for the viable candidates sends a person over to each group that failed to meet the threshold to convince them to support their candidate. Once everyone has decided where to vote, a second tally is taken, and the results are then sent to Democratic state party headquarters -- not electronically but via ordinary mail.

The Iowa Democratic Party keeps the total vote tally a secret and only releases the percentage of delegates won by each candidate, so it all comes down to how many delegates each precinct has, not the popular vote.

By comparison, the rules governing the 1,781 Republican caucuses, which are held on the same night as the Democrats, are pretty simple. The Republican caucuses will use a secret ballot, and, since there is no viability threshold, each vote is simply tallied and the number of votes each candidate gets is reported to party headquarters.

The ability of a candidate's supporters to use the persuasion period to win over second-choice voters could be a key factor deciding who comes out on top Thursday night.

"You hit that floor and work it and try to get them. It's like a fun game," Clinton supporter Ed Winfry of Sioux City, Iowa said last month.

Because the rules are so complicated, organization is key. Each campaign needs to get its supporters to the caucus locations by 7:00 p.m. sharp. If they are late, they will not be allowed to vote.

And Iowa's unpredictable winter weather could be a factor and dissuade a candidate's supporters from traveling to a the caucus sites.

Democratic caucus rules also make polling very difficult. Unlike a regular election, when a voter can immediately leave the polling place after he or she casts her ballot, a caucus go-er may have to spend hours caucusing before his or her vote counts. Plus, caucus go-ers without a viable group may end up switching their support to a candidate who had been trailing in standard polls.

The latest CNN/Opinion Research poll released Tuesday shows a tight race, with 33 percent of likely Democratic caucus-goers backing Clinton and 31 percent supporting Obama. But taking into account the survey's sampling error of 4.5 percentage points in the Democratic race, the race is virtually tied.

Former Sen. John Edwards is in third place in the poll at 22 percent.

But the final results could diverge greatly from the polling numbers because it is more likely that a person who tells a pollster that he or she is going to attend a caucus may not do so.

 

[Pessimism]

Wow, that is incredibly....well... at least it's incredible

 

[cookiecutter]

Obama and Huckabee are the winners

Link

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

Huckabee is gay, I'd vote Obama over him in the blink of an eye.

 

[Hubster]

^ Agreed. In pink bike pants dancing at church to Bros kinda gay.

I hope that a Republican doesn't win your election guys. Democrats ftw

 

[Pessimism]

Holy crap.... go Obama!

 

[Krigloch the Furious]

Whoever wins, we lose.

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

That's the case with every election ever. Cry about it.

 

[Mort Divine]

Kucinich or Gravel didn't even get anything

 

[Blind Guardian]

Vote for communism!

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

I hope Obama takes the Whitehouse. He doesn't seem mentally unfit.

Unlike the current babbling alzhiemers afflicted imbecile holding the office.

 

[V.V.V.V.V.]

He is the most honest guy running a good clean campaign not reliant on trashing people and preaching annoyingly. I support him more than most candidates, especially the ones who have the most chance of winning, even if I don't agree with him on some things. Also, yes his head seems screwed on straight...always a good trait for a president to have

 

[Mort Divine]

Yeah, he seems like a good dude.

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

I don't get why being young is bad.

If anything, leaders do thier best work around his age.

 

[cookiecutter]

I think the democrats would have to do something really stupid to lose. All the Republican candidates are flawed and the Republicans have been ruining our country for 8 years

 

[Rabid Headbanger]

Thats ten years to long.

 

[Hubster]

Either way, I think your country is now ready for either the first female president ever, or the first black president ever. Aside from my normal US bashing I have to say that if either Hillary or Obama get in, you folks should be proud of yourselves. It will be a great benchmark overall for raising social equality standards in the world.

I was backing Hillary for some time, but lately I've felt that Obama bears some similarities to our own newly elected Prime Minister Kevin Rudd (who I think seems to have a very successful level of popularity here, which is astounding for politics overall). So now I seem to feel that perhaps Obama would be better, even more so for foreign policy (of course, I'm thinking in terms of an Obama-Rudd partnership).

 

[MasterOLightning]

Obama is certainly a better choice than Clinton. If the disturbing reality of having 24 years of Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton sets in, national morale would be devastated. I think that has something to do with Clinton's 3rd place finish in Iowa. People want something different.

I think most people my age (22) or thereabouts are smart enough to know that nothing will really change regardless, so we had might as not have some geezer, machine politician running the country. Obama is a first term senator from my state, and I think he hasn't been in Washington long enough to be totally corrupted by things there. He's probably the best hope of the viable candidates.

I liked Kucinich the best, but apparently he did not do well at all in Iowa. I can't imagine him picking up steam in other states. I will support Obama now due to lack of better candidates.