The OSCE is Monitoring the US Presidential Elections

The United States invited the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) to monitor the presidential elections in taking place on November 4th, 2008. Individuals from countries abroad have seen this as an opportunity for the US to finally fulfill the OSCE commitments. The fact that the OSCE is monitoring our elections is important because they are experts at monitoring elections, also it is a chance for the US to finally fulfill some of the promises which it has not yet fulfilled.

For a better look at an article with the same topic look at: US Invited OSCE to Monitor Presidential Elections

Votes from Abroad

The race for the Democratic nomination is nowhere near its end. As things stand now, there are numerous people serving our country overseas that need to cast their delegate votes for Clinton or Obama. “Democrats Abroad (a group comprising Americans living overseas) awards its 11 delegate votes in half-vote increments” (The path to 2008 presidential nomination). There are still 10 states holding their primaries between April 22nd and June 7,th until then the winner is still unclear. Of those 11 delegate votes awarded to the Democratic Party 4.5 have casted their vote for Obama while 2.5 have casted their vote for Clinton. “Democrats abroad will send 22 delegates to the national convention, where each will cast half a vote” (The path to 2008 presidential nomination). How these delegates will influence the outcome of the Democratic nominee we will just have to wait and see.

Clinton's BIG Mistake

Hilary Clinton is in big trouble proving her credibility after flat out lying to the press. If she did not undergo any serious dangerous events as the first lady, then why make things up? Clinton failed big time, she forgot the most important thing about lying to the press: there is always footage to back your story up. And in her case the footage aided in proving that she is LIAR, round up your votes Obama because you are going to start getting all of Clinton’s real soon. Aside from loosing votes to Obama, Clinton faces the chances of loosing votes to McCain if she manages to secure her party’s votes to those undecided voters. No-one likes a liar, and if you are undecided why would you choose a person who has proved to be liar over one who has proven to be honest? The bottom line as I see it is that if Clinton wins her party’s nomination, then her party faces a bigger likelihood of loosing the presidency once more to a Republican.

The Obama Scandal

Obama’s image seems to have been hindered by the latest news that his pastor has said some pretty anti-American things. However, people need to realize that one man’s opinion is not another man’s opinion. Obama has strong ties with his pastor because he preaches the word of God, in a manner which Obama regards as honest, but not everything that the pastor believes (especially outside of religion) is believed by Obama. This is perhaps the reason why the pastor’s views have not really affected Obama. However, as a voter I believe that it might affect him negatively with those voters that are undecided and the independent voters that do not follow any one particular party. This is something that Obama needs to take into consideration, especially if he wins his party’s nomination. He needs to find the most strategic way to win the votes of those people that are up against the fence and do not know which way to vote.

Facial Features as a Determining Factor in Who Gets Elected

I found this interesting article and I just thought I share with everyone. I don’t fully agree with its main argument that physical features are a great way of predicting the next president, but study findings are amazing. According to the article, Australian university students and New Zealand schoolgirls were asked to judge photographs of the US presidential election contenders and rate that would be more competent. The results found that John McCain had received the most votes with Mitt Romney trailing close behind (and it is known that right after Super Tuesday Romney was slightly behind McCain). The study also found Clinton to be ahead of Obama slightly. Whether she is capable of winning or not, we will just have to see.

* I did not agree on what was said about Bush. Bush having masculine features which makes him a great contender during times of war? I don’t think so. Plus I don’t think that looks have much to do with who wins presidency. Think about it, how many US presidents were actually good looking. Besides Kennedy and Clinton, I can’t think of any others.

Obama as Running Mate for Clinton

After winning the primaries in Texas, Ohio, and Rhode Island last week Clinton arrogantly said that Obama would make a great Vice-president since he is too inexperienced to become president. I found this comment interesting, since as things stand now there is no clear Democratic winner. Also, as I had mentioned in my last post no-one candidate could win the 2,025 votes needed to win. So I am left with the question, what makes Clinton so confident that she will win. I see a 50-50 chance that either candidate can win, but after seeing Clinton’s attitude in this campaign I really do hope that Obama wins.

1. Before Super Tuesday:

• The result of the primaries indicated that it was going to be a close race between Mitt Romney and John McCain and Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton.
• It was understood that the above candidates were going to be disputing the presidency and the other contenders were out of the race.

2. On Super Tuesday:

• John McCain is the Republican contender
• Barack Obama has the upper hand; however, it is too early to determine the Democratic winner
  

3. Now

• John McCain is clearly the Republican winner
• Hilary Clinton won the necessary votes to still be active in disputing her spot for the Democratic candidate in November
• It is clear that the Democratic candidate will need votes from the party officials to determine the winner since neither candidate will be able to win enough delegates in the remaining primaries and caucuses to secure the nomination

Winning the Democratic Nomination

“Based on their current delegate counts, neither candidate can win enough delegates in the remaining primaries and caucuses to secure the nomination without the help of nearly 800 party officials and top elected officials who also have a voice in the selection” (Kuhmhenn and Woodward). This is a statement made by Jim Kuhnhenn and Calvin Woodward in regards to the Democratic candidates running for presidency. I believe that this is a scary thought, and as a citizen I would rather have the votes from Florida and Michigan be counted instead of having delegates choice the Democratic nominee. Otherwise, the Democratic winner should be determined by the number of votes. The person with the most votes deserves to win; I think it’s the fairest thing. The problem that I have with party officials determining the winner (which I believe numerous other voters also have) is the fact that we, the citizens, are not choosing the democratic nominee, therefore, our voice is not being heard. What scares me the most is having another fiasco like in the 2000 elections where Bush won the presidency although the plurality of voters voted for Al Gore. It is times like these that causes me to believe that the current political system that we have is outdated and should be reformed to better fit today’s voters.

Obama and Cuba

As a Cuban and as a South Floridian, I really like Obama’s stand on dealing with the new “Cuban government.” I agree with him that the new president should meet with Raul Castro to try to better Cuban-American relations. Also, the new president should attempt to instill Democratic ideas in Cuba. Furthermore, I agree with Obama, that the US government should loosen “the restrictions on remittances from family members to the people of Cuba, as well as travel restrictions for family members who want to visit their family members in Cuba.” This sounds like a great idea, and I believe it will benefit the Cuban people living in Cuba. It is time that Cuban-US relations change. I also agree with him that this should occur in other countries that the US has a hostile relationship with. Talking with those that we disagree with and attempting to establish friendly relations is certainly the way to go.

Tuesday's Democratic Debate in Texas

After seeing the Tuesday democratic presidential debate, I changed my mind on the candidate that I am supporting. This is probably the case with many other Clinton supporters. My coworkers and I had a small talk about the issues and the two candidates, and we basically had to agree that Clinton was too emotional. “Who wants an emotional president, that might wake up one morning and blow up the whole country,” my coworker jokingly said, but he is right. Clinton’s attitude and actions could have a negative effect on manner in which American policy is carried out, and I don’t want anyone’s feelings affecting the country that I live in. Many of us were Clinton supporters, but after seeing the manner in which Obama talked, we said wait a minute he’s definitely the better candidate. Also, after winning the votes of ten consecutive states, there is a big possibility that Clinton is out of the picture. So I guess now I have made a prediction on the two obvious candidates running for the presidency in November: Obama and McCain. As polls have recently showed the American public, Obama is most likely to win the presidency. I guess America will be making history this presidential election.

Technology as a Factor in the Increase of Young Voter Turnout.

As an article by Openers: The Plain Dealer Political Blog demonstrates, young voter turnout for this year’s primaries has increased two or three times more than in 2000 (voters under 30). When asked, younger voters said they were itching for a chance to make a change. They have succeed. The article stresses that a major factor for the increase in voter turnout under 30, is encouragement from their peers. How? You might ask, here are a few ways that younger voters are spreading their enthusiam to become active and Vote:

· Cell phones (we text enough as it is, so why not send text messages on election day to remind all your friends to vote)
· Laptops (god knows we are on our computers Iming or on Myspace.com and Facebook.com during class hours, so why not send all your friends messages or post a message on your profile telling them to vote)
· Conversations (instead of talking about how much you love your new haircut, talk about something that matters, such as the importance that our vote has on the US presidential elections)

Also here are some things that student like us are doing to spread the message:

1. Showing up at political events, recording it, and blogging about it.

2.Starting new organizations such as the Student Association for Voter Empowerment, founded by Matthew Segal (22 year-old).

3. Promoting their candidate’s campaign through Facebook or Myspace

Muslims and the 2008 Presidential Elections

Ahmer Muzammil, author of American Muslims and Presidential Elections 2008 makes an excellent point. The article stresses the need for American Muslims to become more involved in the presidental elections by voting. Muslims are a growing majority in the US, since 20,000 Americans convert to Islam yearly and many Muslims are migrating to the West due to their country’s lack of human rights and ill treatment of their citizens. According to Muzammil, the Muslimsin population in the US is almost as large as the Jewish population, thus just like this large diaspora, they need to have their voices heard. As a Muslim the author advices Muslims:
· Do not strictly vote for one party (as most Cubans do).*
· Do not make one party the enemy (Bush is not the entire Republican party).*
· Muslims should voice their discontent with American Foreign Policy.
· Make the US politicians realize that American Muslims are a voting community.
· Muslim citizens need to become register voters (if they are not registered) and VOTE.

*Note: The comments made in parenthesis are my comments and do not reflect the views of the author of the article.

Young Poll Workers Can Make a Difference

As a young voter, I have to agree with MTV’s article “Young Poll Workers Can Help Prevent Another Vote-Counting Fiasco In November.” It is true that young people can make a difference by volunteering in the polls. Since numerous poll sites are currently using new technology to record poll results, I believe that younger employees are more qualified to work since they are more familiar with the technology that is being used. As the article emphazises, older poll workers are “unfamiliar and intimidated” with the new machines being used at voting sites. Furthermore, due to their familiarity with technology, the presence of young poll voters could help the U.S. avoid another fiasco as occurred in the 2000 election were votes had to be recounted. If votes have to be recounted, younger individuals are more agile to count votes by hand. A problem that has been reported in the primaries this year is long lines lasting 9-12 hours, in states such as New Jersey and Georgia. In order to avoid this younger individuals can help since they can better guide individuals with their agility, and perhaps their help can speed up the voting process.
Certain things that could be done in order to speed the voting process and reduce fiascos during this and other elections include:

• Better train poll workers
• Replace lever and punch card machines with electronic or optical scan machines
• Conduct random checks of poll machines in order to avoid fiascos
• Avoid using machines that could be easily tampered with.
  

Revisting the Results of Super Tuesday

First and for most I would like to begin by fixing a big detail in my previous blog. I wrote my last blog Wednesday, however, I did not have a chance to post it until Sunday. By then Mitt Romney had freshly dropped out of the presidential race, and now the two Republicans that remain are Mike Huckabee and John McCain. Given this piece of information, Huckabee was able only to win 5 states, while McCain won 9 states. Furthermore, McCain had the upper hand on the number of delegates that were won, thus it is extremely easy to predict the Republican winner from here, and I have no doubt that John McCain will be the winner. On the other hand, the Democratic winner is far from clear. Clinton has won the vote of 9 states, while Obama won 11 states; also the number of delegates each won is extremely close. There is no clear winner here. Although numerous websites present Obama as most likely to win, I believe that Hillary Clinton is the stronger candidate in this case for she has more experience. However, I will refrain at this moment from making any further predictions about who will win the Democratic nomination, for I believe it is an extremely close race and at this moment, and Obama or Clinton could come out victorious. We will just have to wait until Tuesday to see who will have the upper hand, Obama or Clinton.

Super Tuesday's Results

After Super Tuesday, the candidates that are in the lead are Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain, however, it is important to note that Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney are close behind. Super Tuesday is designed to demonstrate which candidates from both parties are in the lead and ultimately will have the upper hand in the primary elections, however after tuesday, the possible winners were not crystal clear since Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney were only a few points behind their opponents. How will the primary elections turn out? Who will win their party's nomination? We will just have to wait and see until more states vote in their primaries and a clear winner can be recognized.

Super Tuesday

With Super Tuesday coming up in this tuesday, it will be interesting to see which candidate will take the lead and most likely end up winning their party's nomination for the presidency. However, it will be interisting to find out wether the candidate that will be in the lead after Super Tuesday will actually end up winning the nomination for president since as of now the race is pretty close (at least between the Democrats Clinton and Obama and the Republicans Romney and McCain). Thus I will continue to keep you posted on which candidate, from both the Democratic and Republican parties, is one step closer to being their party's nominee.
I predict that the Democratic candidate in the November ballot will be Hillary Clinton, while the Republican candidate on the ballot will be McCain. From there, let the best candidate win (of course this will determined by the opinion of the US citizens, unless of course something like the 2000 election occurs again).
So I leave you all with this question to ponder upon: Would the US presidency continue to belong to the white man, or will the US be ready for a change and choose a woman or perhaps an African-American as the next president? I anxiously await the November election to see if the US is finally ready for a CHANGE! I think it is, do you?

The Floridian Primaries

I want to begin by apologizing for not posting earlier since Tuesday was election day in Florida and crucial to the essence of this blog. With that said, the Floridian presidential nominees are Republican John McCain and Democrat Hilary Clinton. However, as many of you might already know the Democratic vote did not count. Why? The Democratic Party was penalized for early voting. Why did the Democrats even bother to vote? Well, look at it this way: if every Democrat in the state of Florida voted (or the majority) then it is clearer to see which candidate is more favorable. Since Florida is one of the four crucial states in the presidential elections (due to the large quantities of electoral votes it possesses) it gives one a better picture of which candidate is in the lead. Therefore regardless of how cliché this might sound: Every Vote Counts. I would like to end this post by thanking every individual that voted, you did a good thing!

Race and Gender Should not Be a Defining Factor In Who Is Elected to the Presidency

As http://www.courant.com/news/local/hcpoll30127.artjan27,0,7504446.story?page=1 points out, there is an ongoing debate on whether the US would be making a more profound historic event by electing an African American or a woman president. The author of the article says that democratic women see a woman president as a more profound event, while democratic men and republicans view an African American as a more groundbreaking historical event. To all this talk of race and gender, I have one question: What does it matter if the next president is a woman or African American? Instead of talking about race and gender, we should focus on the issues. Both candidates (Obama and Clinton) are magnificent, but instead of bickering back and forth with one another, they should focus on the issues. What is important is how we can make this country better. The next president should be focused on helping the middle class and getting rid of the massive deficit that President Bush has created in our economy. All I know that both the Democratic and Republican candidates running in the primaries are better fit to run this country than the current president we have. I am interested in hearing the ISSUES and the candidates’ SOLUTIONS from both parties, instead of the ongoing bickering that has been occurring. So I propose something to all of you, stop thinking Black or White, Male or Female, and lets start thinking about what we could do to make this country better!

For more information look at:
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080126/OPINION02/801260316/1039/OPINION
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iNxTApa2sQRu0Xx99P3jt2bEXw7gD8UD2GT01

The Effect of the Young Vote on the Election

As I had mentioned in my previous post this is my first year voting, thus I am extremely interested in the impact of young voters (primarily ages 18-29) in the election. As had occurred four years ago in the previous presidential election, young voters are making an impact in who gets elected for the presidency. Although it was not significant enough for the Democratic candidate to win the Floridian electoral votes, in Miami-Dade County the Democrat won the majority of the votes. This was a breakthrough in voting history since the large Cuban population in Miami always votes Republican. What can account for this change you might ask? Well, it was the large number of first time voters which tend to vote for the democratic party. As mentioned in the book American Government and Politics Today, individuals from lower socioeconomic classes tend to vote democratic, as well as those students that attend universities. The reason being is due to the major influe nce that liberal professors have on students (these individuals also tend to vote for the democratic party). Furthermore, I am interested in viewing the effect of first time voters in this election; during the last election a number of my friends were dying to vote (Democratic), but could not due to their age, now that they are able to vote it is important to ponder what effect it will have on the voting outcome in South Florida, and better yet in Florida as it whole? Will Florida continue to be a Republican state or will the young populatation be strong enough for us Floridians to become finally a DEMOCRATIC STATE?

For further information look at the following links:
http://www.civicyouth.org/quick/youth_voting.htm
http://www.yda.org/tools/19/youth-statistics
http://mcdac.blogspot.com/2007/12/medina-county-voting-patterns-by-age.html

Welcome

Hello World, Welcome to my Blog! Since this is the first Presidential Election that I am to be active in, I am extremely interested in following the candidates that are running for presidency. As an initial warning I apologize if I am in any way biased to one particular candidate or party, for I am a Democrat and I do not intend to hide it in any way, shape, or form. With that said, I am looking forward to any disagreements that I may encounter with any of my fellow readers; for I am extremely interested in EVERYONE's valuable opinion.
Thank you and Enjoy!
Jennifer Espinet