Unfortunately most people are unaware of what each candidate and party truly represents, they just vote according to their party affiliation. A prominent politician once told me that, 45% of voters will vote for our party no matter what, 45% will vote for the other party no matter what, and our entire campaign will focus on the remaining 10%. Whenever I hear someone tell me that they are voting for a particular candidate because they are a  democrat or republican, I always think of George Washington’s, the father of the nation, farewell speech in which he warned against the party system , “It serves to distract the Public Councils, and enfeeble the Public Administration….agitates the Community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms; kindles the animosity of one….against another….it opens the door to foreign influence and corruption…thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.” If you were to look around the political battlefield you will notice that all of George Washington’s warnings from September 26, 1796 are present in our system today. We are supposed to be more knowledgeable, more aware of the world than the simpletons of the 18th century, yet the political landscape of “the most important election in our lifetime” was summarized by a farmer Virginia, some 77,470 days ago. If Barrack Obama was a republican and John McCain a democrat, would your vote change?

If George Washington was alive today he would have also warned of an even bigger threat, the media. The media can manipulate anything into anything. They can make the day look like the night or the good into bad, as long as it helps them gain more viewers, readers, or listeners. It is this monster that has helped decide previous elections, and will help decide this election. According a report by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ), a non-partisan & non-political research organization, the media Election 2008 has been favoring democratic presidential candidate Barrack Obama. He has been represented in a clearly positive tone 36% of the stories, in a neutral tone 35% of the stories, and in a negative tone 29% of the stories. John McCain has been represented in a clearly positive tone in only 14% of the stories, in a neutral tone 29% of the stories, and in a negative tone in a shocking 57% of the stories. A noticeable trend during this election cycle was that the media reports (positive or negative), people watch-read-listen, polls are conducted reinforcing what the media had reported, and then once again the media reports on those polls which just report the views originally expressed by the media. Come Election Day people vote for whoever is leading in the polls.

Another major threat to truly honest elections are polls. They are conducted by various organizations, media outlets, and parties to gauge the views of the public. Benjamin Disraeli, A lifelong 19th century politician and writer from Britain once said, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Even though we are in the 21th century nothing has changed. The political polls which you see and hear can easily be manipulated. They are conducted by calling “potential voters”, no verification required anyone can claim that they are a potential voter. Usually the sample poll size is from 500-3000, with a margin-of-error of 2-4 percentage points, and usually a 95% confidence level. Just call the right 500 people and you can show the case for anything. There are many variables in the polling process which may skew the results such as polling questions, timings, demographics, and tone towards telemarketers.

Last and probably the most important threat to an honest election is money, also known as “campaign contributions”. When you vote for a candidate you aren’t just voting for them or their party, you are also voting for the ideology of all the major contributors of their campaign. There is a reason millions of dollars were given by various organizations and corporations to both candidates, it isn’t charity. This election, so far, the contributions in the presidential race have been as follows: Agribusinesses: $3.5million to democrats, $5.4million to republicans; Communications/Electronics: $32.3million to democrats, $9million to republicans; Construction: $8.4million to democrats, $10.9million to republicans; Defense: $1.5million to democrats, $1.2million to republicans; Energy & Natural Resources: $3.9million to democrats, $6.5million to republicans; Finance, Insurance & Real Estate: $65million to democrats, $58.6million to republicans; Health: $24.7million to democrats, $13.5million to republicans; Lawyers & Lobbyists: $68.5million to democrats, $20.6million to republicans; Transportation: $2.6million to democrats, $4.8million to republicans; Misc Businesses: $46.3million to democrats, $28.7million to republicans; Labor: $885,897 to democrats, $33,695 to republicans; Ideological/Single-Issue: $17.7million to democrats, $9.4million to republicans; Other/Unknown: $100.9million to democrats, $56.7million to republicans. Contributors donating more than$50million for democrats are Other/Unknown, Lawyers & Lobbyists, and Finance, Insurance & Real Estate. For republicans they are Finance, Insurance & Real Estate, and Other/Unknown. If any industry gave you $50million (or even a few million dollars) would you not lean towards them? History has shown us time over time that money does influence people’s actions. Just so you know both Obama and McCain accepted donations from lobbyists and their organizations. Recently the Obama campaign has been questioned over millions of dollars in campaign contributions made using pre-paid (untraceable) credit cards to the Obama Campaign, leading to speculation that these donations are from illegal sources. I hope that isn’t true but it is politics after all. Barack Obama is the first major presidential candidate to refuse public financing altogether, since its inception in 1976. George Bush and John Kerry became the first candidates to refuse public financing during the primary elections, but both accepted the general election public grant. John McCain followed in their footsteps and refused public financing during the primary elections but accepted it for the general elections. 527-organazations, such as America Coming Together, MoveOn.org, Media Fund, Sierra Club and Progress For America, which propagate attack advertisements against candidates should be better regulated. They are the reason why candidates today need so much money to win an election. As a nation we should ban all campaign contributions and require that candidates use only public financing.

When you go to vote on Tuesday disregard which party the candidates belong to, disregard who the media says you should vote for, disregard who is winning or losing in the polls, disregard who the annoying telephone calls told you to vote for, and disregard who I tell you to vote for. Vote for the candidate who best represents your ideology, but do keep in mind how the ideology will be influenced by campaign contributors.