A Note on Electability

What is electability? The ability to get elected, of course!

How do we know which candidates are electable?

You could ask the "average American" who's running for President in '08. You could pay attention to who's getting the most coverage on the news in popular current events magazines. You could pay attention to which candidates A-list celebrities are supporting. You could watch the debates and see which candidates get asked the most questions. And, speaking of debates, who are those other guys standing on stage? The ones who aren't asked every question but seem the most genuine when they are asked?

Those, my friends, are the unelectable.

I usually don't pay attention to those guys. I like to put my eggs in the lesser-of-two-evils basket whenever possible. Why vote for someone who has no chance of being elected?

But, this year, in an early Democratic Party debate, I couldn't help but feel like the little guys were more authentic. Especially the littlest one of all of them. Dennis Kucinich caught my eye.

I started to see him pop up in blogs and in an occasional news piece. Against my better judgement, I began to pay attention.

Up there somewhere, I talked about identifying who's electable. There's really a better way to sort 'em out. The candidates who are electable are those running campaigns with money. Lots of money. Money machines, they are.

This is where I get dismayed.

The electable are already in debt to the same a$$holes who are already running the country behind the scenes. And our country ain't in the best of shape, folks.

Dennis Kucinich is already in debt too. Only his debt is owed to the small percentage of Americans who believe in him. Actually, Kucinich joins John Edwards and Barack Obama as being one of the only three Democratic candidates who have accepted less than $10,000 from PACs. Hillary Clinton has already accepted $750,000 and the primaries haven't even hit yet. Finance info can be found here.

The Kucinich campaign is trying to get Dennis recognized. As such, they've begun a contest of sorts on MySpace to have users get creative and make Dennis their profile pic. Since I'm broke and all I could do was buy a bumper sticker, I have upped the ante. Not only has Dennis been my number one friend for a few weeks and I have him linked at the top of my blog, I've now PhotoShopped myself into a picture with Dennis. Maybe I'll win a prize.

Here's the bottom line. Hillary scares me. I don't want my choice to represent an underdog to take a vote away from Barack Obama in the primary but I'm also tired of how people get elected in this country. Yeah, yeah, I'm only one person.

At the end of the day, I may not be Vegan, I may not be attracted to his hot wife, and I may have never seen a UFO, but I've researched and researched and Dennis is my man. Figuratively speaking.