Countdown to Super Tuesday

The nationwide state-by-state voting for the Democratic and Republican Primaries takes place in a little less than a week now, and things are getting just a bit more exciting ’round these here United States.

Firstly, Edwards and Giuliani are out. Giuliani gave his endorsement to Sen. McCain of Arizona while Edwards… well… hasn’t endorsed anyone yet, but it’s hard to see him endorse Sen. Clinton when they’re so different. Oh, and he’s attacked her the most compared to the rest of the Democratic nominees.

An Edwards endorsement for Sen. Obama makes sense as well, especially after Obama took time in his speech today to talk about poverty (something Edwards was centralizing his campaign on).

It’ll be tough for Obama, however. According to the likes of CNN.com and MSNBC.com, Clinton leads in New York and California, which happen to be the two states on Super Tuesday with the most delegates.

I’m excited to see whether the endorsement of the Three Kennedy’s and the debate tomorrow can shift Obama in those two states. It’ll definitely be an interesting couple of days.

On the Republican side it’s essentially between McCain and Romney. McCain will likely take it all unless Romney, or even Huckabee, can pull off some upsets and take back some of the momentum. Although, if McCain wins the nomination there’s a potential problem he could face in the national election. The following sentence:

“I was on the front lines with my friends saying we not only can’t withdraw but we’ve got to have additional troops over there in order for us to have a chance to succeed.”

McCain said that at the GOP debate tonight. And, well, that’s not a very good thing to say when it seems like most of the country is very against the war. Oh, and most importantly want the troops back in the states as soon as possible.

I urge anyone and everyone voting on Super Tuesday to pay attention this weekend. The Super Bowl is on Sunday and people will get a bit distracted with all the Super Bowl Parties and whatnot, but there still are primary elections on Tuesday and they will shape the nomination races in both parties.

GOP YouTube Debates a doozy.

Just a couple days ago the Republicans had their very first YouTube debate on CNN, and boy did they go after each other.

Numerous heated exchanges were the highlight of the debate, with McCain and Romney battling it out over torture and Romney and Giuliani duking it out over ’sanctuary mansions’ and the claim that Romney employed illegal immigrants.

Two people stood out of the debate and the rest made me cringe. Huckabee is a great talker and is easy to like, even though I don’t totally agree with his policies the way he talks makes me understand why he thinks the way he does. The others, like Mitt Romney, just rub me the wrong way and make it seem like they’re ‘double talking.’ Romney’s response to whether he supports homosexuals serving openly in the military was one such example.

Another one that stood out was Ron Paul. He seemed like the only thinker at the debate and he had the best points and arguments in my view.

The Republican side is a mixed bag to me, one on hand there’s candidates like the flip flopping Romney, Bush #2(McCain), and The One Who Relies on New York(Giuliani) and then there’s Huckabee and Paul.  I would not be surprised to see either pick up the nomination, especially since they’re the only ones who performed well at the debate. Well, at least in my eyes.

By far, the worst showing was by Romney. Not only for the attacks by his opponents, which he didn’t defend well. Not only for his constant flip flopping. Not only for his response to the homosexuals in the military question. But also for how he answered the question about black on black crime in urban America: black people just need better parents.

Yes, that’s essentially what he said, and honestly… it’s absurd that he thinks that. Maybe he should have listened one of the twenty times Giuliani explained how he lowered the crime rate in New York City.