Chuck See: “Give ’em Hell, Harry!”

Boy that Barack is really giving ’em hell, isn’t he? And that McCain, given up for dead! But wait, let’s look at the numbers…

Delegate Count – Democrats
State	Date	Delegates	Clinton	Obama	Edwards
Total	–	–	249	179	52
Super Delegates	–	463	201	116	26
Iowa	3-Jan	57	15	16	14
New Hampshire	8-Jan	30	9	9	4
Michigan	15-Jan	0 *	–	–	–
Nevada	19-Jan	33	12	13	–
South Carolina	26-Jan	54	12	25	8
2,025 Delegates Needed to Win (Delegate Counts Come From AP, Wash Post, ABC News & RCP)
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/democratic_delegate_count.html
Delegate Count – Repbulicans
State	Date	Delegates	Romney	Huckabee	McCain
Total	–	–	59	40	36
Unpledged RNC	–	0	–	–	–
Iowa	3-Jan	40	7	30	–
Wyoming	5-Jan	14 *	8	–	–
New Hampshire	8-Jan	12 *	4	1	7
Michigan	15-Jan	30 *	23	1	6
Nevada	19-Jan	34	17	3	4
South Carolina	19-Jan	24 *	–	5	19
1,191 Delegates Needed to Win (Delegate Counts Come From AP, Wash Post, ABC News & RCP)
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/republican_delegate_count.html
Democrats
Candidate	Money Raised	Net Contributions*	Money Spent	Cash on Hand
Hillary Rodham Clinton	$90,935,788	$78,615,215	$40,472,775	$50,463,013
Barack Obama	$80,256,427	$78,915,507	$44,169,236	$36,087,191
John Edwards	$30,329,152	$29,935,179	$17,932,103	$12,397,048
Republicans
Candidate	Money Raised	Net Contributions*	Money Spent	Cash on Hand
Mitt Romney	$62,829,069	$44,063,569	$53,612,552	$9,216,517
Rudy Giuliani	$47,253,521	$44,559,299	$30,603,695	$16,649,826
John McCain	$32,124,785	$30,306,621	$28,636,157	$3,488,628
Ron Paul	$8,268,453	$8,202,085	$2,824,786	$5,443,667
Mike Huckabee	$2,345,798	$2,340,177	$1,694,497	$651,301
Alan Keyes	$22,768	$22,768	$10,139	$12,629
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/2008-presidential-candidates/finance/comparison/

Can that be right? Hillary has 40% more votes than Obama? McCain is running 3rd? But what about what they said on the news? What’s going on here? Well, things aren’t always as the seem, and it seems that in politics things are often not what they seem! What am I saying?

Firstly, did you know that Hillary has lots of friends (we’ll defer talking about how she got them)? And did you further know that many of those friends are influential in the Democratic Party? In fact, her hubby gets to vote for her. Not a stubby little vote like we get, but a great big huge vote equal to tens of thousands of our puny little votes.

Yep, it’s called a Super Delegate. And though they cannot leap tall buildings in a single bound they can change the outcome of an election (which is much more of a super-power, in the end). These “Super Delegates” are people like Democratic Governors, ex presidents, congressfolks, Committee members and other friends of the party. Just a few…well 842, which is about 40% of what it takes to cinch the nomination. You probably think that I am making all this up. But just look it up for yourself or read: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18277678/

Again I ask, What am I saying? What I’m saying is “Why didn’t we know this?” What I’m saying is that the News Media stinks. We are constantly being misled as to who said what, and what is really going on. We’re constantly being fed half truths. But why Chuck, why? You might ask. Well, since you asked…I think it’s because the Media is more interested in making as much money as possible for the owners than it is in keeping us informed. What sells air time? A one-sided clear cut election or a cliff hanger stuffed full of drama? What sells news print?

Ok, you think I’m being a little silly here. It’s just a coincidence that the candidates with the most money are also getting the most delegates (except for Giuliani, which may also say something). But the more important point that I want to make is that the two dominate political parties, Democratic and Republican, have a stranglehold on the American government, and they are not likely to let go of it anytime soon. They decide who will be the few people that you get to choose from for your President. That is not democracy; that is an oligarchy.

But the worst part is that it’s not working. The people are no longer represented by their representatives! That is evident in the sad approval rating that Congress now has. But whose fault is that? Who elected them? Oh my God, We did!

This is just what George Washington warned about in his departing address. So what can we do? It’s not going to be easy, because those who now possess the hallowed halls of government are not simply going to hand them over. We need to stop supporting the major parties. We need to vote for independents. We need to write to our congresspeople and insist that they institute ballot reform to remove the bias from our election system. Ballot requirement should be standardized between states and have the same requirements for all, independent of party affiliation.

You might be surprised to hear the John McCain is the chairman of a non-profit organization (The Reform Institute) that champions some of these issues. But much more is needed, and until we quit voting for the incumbents, we aren’t going to make substantial progress. Once Congress sees some long time incumbents fall, the remainder might get serious about representing the American people.

So I’m here to ask you to do a few things. 1) Be critical. When you hear something about a candidate or the government ask yourself, who is paying for this message? Is it the whole story or a half truth? What does the teller have to gain? 2) Look things up. When you get excited or angry about something you hear, look it up on the internet. We are currently blessed with this resource. You probably won’t get the absolute truth there, but you will get many half truths, and with a little work perhaps you can figure out what the real truth really is. 3) Try to vote for people who will put the power of government back into the hands of the people, via term limits, ballot reform, election reform, etc. 4) Have confidence in your neighbor. Fear is the strongest weapon that the oppressors have. We need to stick together as a people, help each other, watch over each other, and support each other. 5) If there’s not a good candidate in your district, run for congress. We need people who care about what happens to this country, and are willing to sacrifice to make the right things happen.