Sunday, January 06, 2008

Iowa's Bloated Role

Iowa is the first state that helps decide the candidates for the president of the United States. People actually vote based on the results of the Iowa outcome. In 2004, a win by John Kerry in Iowa propelled him to the nomination without much of a fight. As it turned out, he crumbled under the slightest pressure applied by George Bush. Bush called him a flip-flopper who raped children in Vietnam and Kerry countered several years later arguing that the sex was consensual and furthermore that he had always held that position.

Basically, we let 300,000 people in an incestuous state like Iowa decide the two candidates who have a shot in hell of winning the presidency. We are a nation of 300 million people. Only 0.1% of the population have a real voice in who will face off in the general election. Obama won the Democratic portion of that 0.1% with just 38%. Huckabee only grabbed 34% of the Republican part of that 0.1%. It'd be nice if some of the rest of us had a say, especially for those of us whose parents weren't related before marriage.

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