Democratic Candidate, Your Choice

either way vet or not I fear the US will continue on it's path of the bully nation.

And man are these Iraqi reporters going nuts in this press confrence of Saddam's capture as their showing pictures and video. Now I would like to know when the troops will be brought home.

If Hussein has been the one directing the attacks against the troops, that should settle down now. Militarily, there should be no reason to keep more than a security force in Iraq now. Of course, it may take a while for the situation to stabilize enough to determine if the troops could be brought home. But, like you, I hope very soon!

Just my tuppence.

Andy

Just find it sort of sad that Bush originally stated several weeks and this has turned into half a year. Just hope it doesn't turn into another Japan where we stay.

Mr. Bush has reawakened the concept of the "Ugly American". He approaches international diplomacy as a schoolyard bully. It has become embarrasing to be an American. I plan to actively work to get him out of office. If their was a point, I might support a Libertarian candidate, but they have no effect other than to drain support from the democrats. IMO the Libetarian party gave the last presidential election to Bush. Good intentions, sad results. But, as someone once commented, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions".

Well in my case I don't want a dem or rep in office. Neither party cares to uphold the constitution so in my honest opinion neither party should be allowed to hold such coveted positions of power power they seem destine to abuse as Bush has proven and to which the democrates have done nothing to stop same goes for the rep.

Unfortunately, the Republicans and Democrats are all we really have to work with. Many other countries have it better in this respect. They have many smaller splinter parties that form coalitions to win elections.

I keep hearing that there are only 2 Parties, Democrats and Republicans.

However in the 2000 Presidential Election there was 16 People listed on the Ballot. They were as follows with the number of Votes they received:

Brown - 1,606
Libertarian - Browne - 384,431
Buchanan - 448,895
Republican - Bush - 50,456,002
Dodge - 208
democrat - Gore - 50,999,897
Hagelin - 83,714
Harris - 7,378
Lane - 1,044
McReynolds - 5.602
Moorehead - 4,795
Nader - 2,882,955
Phillips - 98,020
Smith - 5,775
Venson - 535
Youngkeit - 161
and last of all Other - 3,315

I have no idea what these Parties are but with a little research I could find out.

Now you will notice that in Popular Vote, Gore won but because we have the Electorial College Vote, Bush won. I have always said that I did not agree with the Electorial College Vote. Even though the person that I voted for won. Yes, I voted for him and unless someone better comes along, I will vote for him again.

how many of them had a realistic chance?

The answer to that is very easy Aon. Every last one of them. They have the same exact rights to funding as any one else.

But it comes down to again, If you want to be heard, you have to be seen, and if you want to be seen, you have to get out there to be heard.

Richard I edited your post slightly to add 3 of the parties. I think I got the right Browne that was libertarian that being Harry Browne but if you find out it was the other Brown could you please revise but I think I got the right browne.

And just as I said except Nader who got 2,882,955 vote no other candidate even broke the 500,000 mark and then out of those only 2 broke the 100,000 mark on votes that being Libertarian - Browne (384,431), Buchanan (448,895), So there is no realy party that would give the main parties a run for their money and it is a shame that some of these 3rd parties aren't joining forces to become a major player in the political arena. That's what I would do if it was me leading the party would be to make treaties as it were with other parties to join forces and become a real player and not just a want to be player.

Scottish2,

Not a problem here your editing my post. And I or whoever finds out who the other parties are, they are more than welcome to edit too.

You are right about the other parties joining forces. The problem with this is that I see a lot of them as being very childish. If they cannot win their parties nomination, they just pack up their toys and go and start another clubhouse. That is not thinking of their party but of themselves.

I again say that I am of NO PARTY. And until I can see someone of another party who is not in my eyes in there not for selfish reasons and who is in the same mind frame work as mine, it will still probably be a Democrat or a Republican that I will vote for.

True, ALL of the political parties have the right to suck up to Big Oil.

well, I'm not really up to date in American Presidential Election policy I have to admit. Can someone actually explain it to me?

As far as I know it is that a certain amount of people (or was it counties? or the whole state) elect someone who then elects the President??
That concept does confuse me a bit.

In Germany it runs like this: you have 2 votes, one for a party and one for a local representative in the Parliament.

On the local count, the one with the most voices gets through. There is a certain amount of seats in the parliament which are then filled. The amount of seats that are still free are filled with the party votes, which are counted out after a system called "Hare/Niemeyer" system:
The amount of all votes for a party are divided by the amount of votes for all parties and then multiplicated by the number of all free seats in the parliament. The qoute of this process is rounded down and gives the number of seats that this party will additionally have.

In the second step, if there are still free seats, the part of the quote that came after the point is determining the number of rest-seats a party will have. In the case that a party got more than half pf all available votes, the rest seating will be done that this party will have a rest seat if it was not the majority in the parliament without this seat.

Sounds awfully complicated. But that is how it is done. You should be able to find a better explanation of the "Hare/Niemeyer" concept under exactly this name on the net somewhere.

Aon,

The way your Voting procedure sounds like is what we call here as ?Voting a straight ticket?. This is when you only vote for people on a particular party. Some people vote on the individual of any of the parties. I am one of those people who votes for the individual instead of the party.

Each office may have several people trying to fill the position. And the person who receives the most votes then takes that office.

We first have what we call a Primary; this is to slim down to one individual in each party. After all the Primaries have been completed, the person who wins then in turns runs in the National Election. Where we again vote in the National Ballot to see which person wins.

How ever the Presidential Election plays a little different game. I do not agree with it, but that is how it is.

Example:

If this was a Presidential Election, the following would happen. However I do not know all the detailed information how one originally gets on the ballot. But to keep this description simple, we start off with the Democratic Party.

EXAMPLE

Democratic Primary: The applicants are;

John Doe
Harry Thomas
Jane Else

We now vote for one of these three. If John Doe receives more votes then any of the others, then He will be on the National Ballot. He in turn runs against People who are in other parties. Then the person who wins the Nationals will then become the President. Even though this is true when it comes to all other offices, the same does not apply to the President. We have what is called The Electoral College. The following will be the example of how this works.

EXAMPLE

Candidates:

John Doe (Democrat)
Brian Webster (Republican)

Now in Ohio, let us say that there are 10 Electoral College votes.

John Doe (Democrat) receives 400 votes.
Brian Webster (Republican) receives 500 votes.

Then Brian Webster wins the 10 votes from Ohio

Now let?s say that Indiana has only 5 Electoral College votes. And the votes were counted with:

John Doe (Democrat) receives 800 votes.
Brian Webster (Republican) receives 100 votes.

Then John Doe wins the 5 votes from Indiana.

Now let us say that these two States were the only two in the U.S. Then Brian Webster would become the President because he would have the most Electoral College votes. Even though John Doe won the Popular vote, Brian Webster won due to the Electoral College.

I hope this helps you to understand a little and if anyone out there can help please do jump in.

And that, boys and girls is how King George was crowned even though his chief opponent got more votes.
Good explanation, Sir Richard.