U.S. Elections

As the U.S. elections progress and primaries draw to a close, the fight for the democratic candidacy grows more fierce. Candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are both 'firsts'- first black man and first woman. We have been warned many times not to use that to decide who to support. However, if we do not look at their ethnicity and gender, what do we look at? Some suggest experience, personality, and day-to-day behavior.

Every few weeks, something big occurs which draws media attention to a single candidate. It can be what they said, what they are doing, who they associate themselves with, and even what their spouses say. Incidents like 'the Bosnian Lie' and Reverend Wright are supposedly bad publicity for the candidates. One could derive that these candidates would steadily lose popularity and eventually quit the race with a never-ending string of bad P.R. That's not what the polls show though.

According to BCC, which keeps track of the popularity polls throughout the campaign, the general pattern of this is that immediately after a 'scandal', their polls drop by a couple points. However, right after the little depression, the candidates' polls sky-rocket.

It would seem that, according to the polls, publicity is beneficial. It doesn't matter what kind of publicity. Some reverend in the past life of a candidate says some inflammatory remarks which most people would most likely not agree with. At the moment, people question the legitimacy of the candidate because of who he associates with.

Hillary Clinton, though current losing Obama with a deficiency of two hundred delegates, has made it far. She has shown toughness, stamina, and persistence in one of the longest presidential campaigns in American history.

She has fought hard and come back time and time again in the 2008 primary season, defying the experts who insisted on writing her political obituary prematurely. She