pvenice

A paper I wrote for one of my classes... Hope you enjoy!

On November 4, 2008, Americans will make one of the most important decisions that they will ever make. The Bush Administration is beginning to come to an end, and it is up to the American people to decide who the next person to lead the free world will be. Of course, the election process is already in full swing, slightly earlier than usual. Many news media pundits and politicians around the country are speculating as to who the next President will be; millions of dollars have been spent conducting polls so that we can all have an idea as to who will win, and the early figures are beginning to show us what lies ahead for our country. Of course, it is highly unlikely that a candidate not a part of the Republican Party or the Democratic Party will carry enough votes to win the election. Given that, an important step in predicting the next President of the United States would be to decide which candidate will win from both of the major parties. For the Democratic Party, the general consensus is that the current Senator from New York, Mrs. Hillary Clinton, will be the Democratic nominee. It seemed up until a few months ago that her two main Democratic rivals, Sen. Barack Obama and Former Sen. John Edwards had a chance to defeat Sen. Clinton for the Democratic nomination, but those claims have since been silenced. Senator Obama’s national poll numbers have declined sharply in the past few months, as have Senator Edwards’. Most importantly, however, is the fact that Senator Clinton has gained a lot of popular support in the “key states” (states that hold their primaries/caucuses before most of the other states do). This is extremely important to her campaign because typically the winners of the first few states have a much greater chance to win the nomination. In Iowa, the first caucus state, Sen. Clinton seems to be the favorite to win but she is closely trailed by Sens. Obama and Edwards. That may be the only reasonably close early contest. According to the latest CBS News/ New York Times Poll, Sen. Clinton has a substantial lead of 15% in New Hampshire, the first Democratic primary. According to many polls, the Senator is sweeping all of the first primary states, including South Carolina, Florida, and Nevada. Also to be noted is the fact that Sen. Clinton and Sen. Chris Dodd are the only two candidates that are on the ballot in the Michigan Democratic primary, which provides for a very large total of delegates. Sen. Clinton is beating Sen. Dodd by ridiculous amounts of votes, so that will a huge delegate pickup for Clinton. It is, at best, unreasonable to expect that any Democrat currently in the race can beat Hillary Clinton for the nomination. Given that, we now know who the Republican candidate will likely be running against. The Republican race for the nomination is far more complex than the Democratic race. There are still five viable candidates that all, if they play their cards right, have the ability to win the nomination. The current frontrunner, former Mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani, is most certainly going to be difficult for any Republican to beat; however, it seems as if a perfect storm is causing the inherent decline of the efficiency of the Giuliani campaign. Unlike the Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, the former Mayor is not leading in either of the first two primary states. In fact, he isn’t even close. In Iowa, Former Gov. Mitt Romney has a fairly substantial lead on the field, and another Former Gov., Mike Huckabee, has stolen 2nd Place from Giuliani. In New Hampshire, the favorite is also Mitt Romney, and the numbers aren’t even remotely close. The most recent CBS/ New York Times Poll has Romney carrying 34% of the vote, and 2nd place, which belongs to Sen. John McCain, has a remarkably low 16%. It is my firm belief that the winners of the first two primary states will get an extremely significant bump in the nationwide polls. If this is true, than Mitt Romney, who is currently holding 2nd place in many of the states that Rudy Giuliani is winning, will win many of these states after his incredible success in Iowa and New Hampshire. Of course, this course of events is not entirely set in stone; there are other candidates who have great chances to offset the surge of Mitt Romney. The most notable opposition to Romney’s victory in Iowa would be a man by the name of Mike Huckabee. The former Governor of Arkansas has picked up many incredibly valuable endorsements from Christian Right, causing an unthinkable surge in Huckabee’s numbers, particularly in Iowa. A few polls that have been reported from Iowa show that Huckabee is gaining quickly on Romney, and with the primary a little more than a month away, this could be devastating to the Romney campaign. The other issue that Romney has to deal with is the newest addition to the Republican race, Former Senator Fred Thompson of Tennessee. While Thompson does not appear to be incredibly competitive in states like Iowa and New Hampshire, Thompson is basing his campaign strategy on his lead in the vast majority of southern states. Since many of these states hold their primaries on “Super Tuesday”, the day when many of the primary delegates pledge their support according to the outcome of the votes in their respective states. While Giuliani looks to have a great delegate pickup on Super Tuesday, Fred Thompson might just have a statistically significant total of delegates as well. The problem that this would cause for Romney is the fact that he is not at all competitive in the southern states, and if he wants to have enough delegates to compete with Rudy Giuliani’s total, he is going to have to find some success in places other than the Northeast and the Midwest. Even if Thompson were to drop out of the race due to lack of funding and nationwide support (which seems to be a very real option), the south would be left practically wide open for rivals Giuliani, Huckabee, and McCain, which would provide for an even bigger problem for Romney. Given that these two scenarios are possible, they are highly unlikely. Romney is picking up key Evangelical endorsements, and is maintaining his significant lead of the money race. He completely stunned the nation when he rose almost double of what his closest two rivals (McCain and Giuliani) did in the First Quarter of 2007. The first quarter of the year before an election year is often called the “money primary” because it is a great indicator of how well the candidate can raise money nationwide in the heat of the primary season. Not only did he win the so-called “money primary”, but he continued to maintain his fundraising lead on his opponents. On a more personal level, I feel that in an election year where the “establishment candidate” (Giuliani) fails to adequately represent the values of more than half of the Republican Party, it provides a situation where he will eventually discover that the people deciding on the nomination will reject his candidacy based on his more liberal values. This causes the voters to decide which other candidate they will support, and in this case, there were many different candidates to choose from. McCain was initially rejected because of his more liberal social values, and the other candidates that many felt were “true conservatives” were not strong enough to take the lead from Giuliani. In short, the left wing of the Republican Party has overwhelmingly thrown its support in the direction of Giuliani, and the right wing (the bigger piece) of the Republican Party has split its support among Romney, Huckabee, Thompson, Tancredo, and Hunter. As the race progresses, more people on the conservative wing will move closer towards one candidate. The strongest of the candidates that I have just listed is of course, Mitt Romney. When the right establishes Mitt Romney as its establishment candidate, he will presumably overtake Giuliani as the frontrunner. Romney has plenty of characteristics that will greatly benefit him, including a tremendous ability to communicate with his audience. He communicates much better that any candidate currently running for the Republican nomination to the point that he almost enchants his audience. Regardless of your political opinion on the Bush Administration, we can all agree that for the past seven years, the presidency has greatly lacked both charisma and linguistic ability, and I personally feel that has greatly contributed to the President’s disapproval rating. Knowing this, I think that the American people are more than ready for a President that has these abilities. They are great indicators of effective leadership at a time when leadership is one of the most important qualities that a candidate can bring to the office. That being said, this presents us with the matchup between the predicted Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, and the predicted Republican nominee, Mitt Romney. When considering a competition such as this, it is important to look once again at what the statistics say. The most recent Zogby International poll in regards to such a situation shows that the only Democratic candidates who would beat their Republican rivals in the General Election would be Barack Obama and John Edwards. More specifically, Hillary Clinton lost in a head-to-head matchup to every single one of her potential Republican opponents. Even more specifically is the simple truth that in the poll that pitted Sen. Clinton against Gov. Romney, Romney picked up 43% of the vote while Clinton had only 40%. Generally speaking, Hillary Clinton is losing ground against all of the Republican candidates; it is becoming increasingly apparent that Clinton is being kept afloat merely by one demographic: liberal, white women. Of course she is winning people from other demographics, but she is winning the vast majority of Democratic women in the primary, which when truly observed, is more than enough support to win the Democratic nomination. However, one demographic is not near enough to win a nationwide election in which Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, and Independents will be voting; many different groups of people will be represented in the General Election than will be represented in just the Democratic primary. However important demographics are in deciding the next President of the United States, it would be extremely beneficial to take a closer look at the Electoral College, the system that actually chooses the next President, in order to more accurately predict the winner of the White House. As it stands right now, there will be many swing states that the nominees from both parties will be fighting over intensely. While highly populated states such as California, New York, Illinois and Michigan are guaranteed victories for Sen. Clinton, states like Texas, Georgia, and Tennessee are going to be guaranteed big wins for Gov. Romney. When one leaves the swing states out of the total, Sen. Clinton appears to have around 223 electoral votes in the bag whereas Romney will have roughly 157. This absolutely does not mean that Clinton will win the White House based on these numbers, as many of the swing states tend to lean Republican, and 270 Electoral Votes are required to win. The states that I would consider the most key to victory on either side are Ohio (20 Electoral Votes), Pennsylvania (21 Electoral Votes), Florida (27 Electoral Votes), North Carolina (15 Electoral Votes) and Virginia (13 Electoral Votes). If Clinton can win both Florida and Ohio or Pennsylvania, she will win the Presidency. However difficult as it may seem, it is still very possible for a Republican to win in these conditions. The problem that the Republican nominee, whoever that may be, will face in the general election is that Republicans are going to be significantly weaker this election cycle, largely thanks to an extremely unpopular incumbent Republican President. Many states that Republicans have won in the past that have helped them get to the White House are vulnerable to Democratic takeover this election cycle. Typically, states like Virginia, North Carolina, Arizona and Missouri are never even seriously targeted by the Democratic candidate, largely because they know that those states will surely vote Republican. This time, however, the Democrats appear to be far more competitive in these states, which could in the end result in a Democratic victory. However, if Mitt Romney wins the nomination and then adds a “true conservative” to his ticket; making them the Vice-Presidential Candidate, he can easily carry the states that he needs to win. For example, a person like Mike Huckabee or Fred Thompson would boost southern and traditional red-state support for Romney, who only has strong support in the Northeast and West. In this scenario, Romney would presumably carry Louisiana, Arkansas, Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia, pushing his total to 227. Also, if Romney were to make more publicly conservative statements to appeal to the conservative base of the party on a greater level, he could certainly gain greater support from his party and increase his chances of winning states like Missouri and Arizona, pushing his total to 248. As significantly higher than 157 as this may seem, it is still not enough to push him over the 270 threshold. This most certainly validates the importance of winning Ohio and/or Pennsylvania for both candidates. If Ohio loans its support to the Republican candidate as it traditionally has, Romney will get to 268, but still not 270. In Romney’s worse-case scenario, he would then fail to win the “real” swing states: New Mexico, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, and Sen. Clinton would reach the 270 mark. As ridiculous as it may sound, it is very possible that this election could come down to one or two electoral votes. The other scenario would involve Clinton’s Vice-Presidential choice. Even if Romney uses a “true conservative” on the back of his ticket, Clinton could very easily change the course of the entire election if she were to pick the right person to be the Vice-Presidential candidate. Clinton’s ideal situation would be choosing Former Gov. of New Mexico Bill Richardson. Not only would he help to ease the attacks on Clinton about inexperience, but he would help in what will be one of the key battlegrounds of the election: the Southwest. Since the illegal immigration debate has become so much more widespread than it was in the last election, many Latino-Americans will be more than willing to vote for Democrats more sympathetic to their cause. Bill Richardson will ensure victory in New Mexico and possibly Colorado. He will also take Arizona out of Romney’s guaranteed column, and move it to the swing column until Election Day. If this happens, Clinton puts herself in very good position to pass the 270 mark. Another smart move that Clinton could make to ensure victory is to place Former Gov. of Virginia (and Former Democratic Presidential Candidate) Mark Warner at the bottom of the ticket. Even if Romney were to put a southern conservative as the Vice-Presidential Candidate, Mark Warner would most certainly ease the effect that they would have on Romney’s Electoral Vote total, as it would make Clinton more competitive in the south and most certainly in Virginia, West Virginia, and North Carolina. Also to be considered about Warner is that he has a more conservative appeal than Clinton does. He is a premier conservative Democrat who will most certainly help Clinton with winning over moderates and undecided voters. This seems like the most reasonable option not only because of the Electoral appeal that this ticket would have, but because of the fact that if she were to use Gov. Richardson - a Hispanic-American - on the ticket, it would be a double-minority ticket, which may have hurt them when trying to win over some voters. There are a few situations, however, that could completely change the nature of the race. On October 12, 2007, one of the most prominent and most popular Democrats in the United States, Al Gore, won a Nobel Peace Prize. His adoption of the single issue of global warming has caused him to have superstar appeal nationwide, and have in turn made him one of the most popular political figures in the United States. With the money, support, and special interests associated with his stance on global warming, he could easily wrestle the nomination out of Hillary Clinton’s hands even if he entered now. Think about it: he mounted an extremely successful campaign in 2000 to win the Democratic nomination, and that was without the superstar appeal that he has now. As possible as it would be for him to win the nomination, he has repeatedly stated that he does not intend to do so. However, if Hillary’s status as the “establishment candidate” continues to decline, it is very possible that one of the party elite will have to step in to avoid the appearance of the party looking chaotic and disunited. That would be the perfect opportunity for him to step in and capture the nomination. Another interesting development that has occurred within the past year has been the change in party affiliation of current New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. A few months ago, Bloomberg discontinued his affiliation with the Republican Party and instead became independent. Media pundits around the country began to speculate about Bloomberg’s intentions; many stated that he was disaffiliating with the Party because his liberal views would disallow him to gain mass support from the conservative base of the party, and would make him unable to win the nomination. If he were to announce an independent bid for the White House, it could have amazingly detrimental effects on both parties’ bid for the presidency. For many Republicans, he is fiscally conservative enough to steal votes from whoever the nominee is, particularly if it were Rudy Giuliani because the two share many of the same social and fiscal values. For Democrats, he is socially liberal enough to steal a nice chunk of their base. Many Democrats are also fiscal conservatives, so he would gain in that respect as well. To also be considered is the fact that in order for any independent to mount a successful (and late) bid for the presidency, they must have a considerably large pool of money to use. The last remotely successful independent bid was that of Ross Perot, and even he didn’t win a single electoral vote. However, I personally feel that Bloomberg has a few things already going for him that Perot didn’t. First and foremost, Bloomberg has political experience that Perot didn’t, not to mention the fact that Bloomberg is already a popular political figure among many Americans. Overall, Bloomberg has a great opportunity to at least make a tremendous run for the Presidency, and while it is highly unlikely that he will win, he has the opportunity to become the first independent ever to win an electoral vote, if not many of them. This could very well be the most important election in the history of the United States. With the stakes so high, it is important that Americans be informed about the issues and the candidates. There is so much that can still happen in this race that it would be unfair to say that we have a general idea as to what is going to happen. We know that the Democrats will nominate somebody for President, and they will choose a Vice-Presidential candidate. We also know that the Republicans will do the same thing. It is also possible that there are still some people who have not entered who could have a chance to at least compete in the race, if not win it. I personally have my own beliefs about what will happen, and I can provide logical arguments to support my claims, but by no means do I believe that I absolutely know what will happen. The current political climate of this nation could certainly change very drastically in another 11 months, so it is unfair for anybody to say that they know who will win and how. All that anybody can look at is what the polls say, what historical trends say, and what the mood of the people is. We can all agree, however, that the next year will be a very exciting one in the political realm of things. It should be a beautiful display of democracy at work, in an effort to pick the best person to continue the values of this republic. In conclusion, I would like to encourage you to adamantly seek out the truth of the current issues and the candidates running for the most powerful office on the face of the planet. Register to vote, stay informed, and on November 4, 2008, make one of the most important decisions of your life.