This article
http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1573404/20071102/index.jhtml
from the MTV website (a surprisingly respectable news source) is about the popular talk-show host and political comedian Stephen Colbert, who announced recently on his show that he would run for president. Although he may have been saying it tongue firmly in cheek, it was clear he intended to actually run through the steps. His effort to get on the ballot, though, was stopped by the Democratic party in his home state of South Carolina. Why? To win the presidency, one must be on the ballot in all 50 states, and to achieve that takes a lot of money – hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars; funds the party considers better channeled to more “viable” candidates.
Current campaign laws consider anyone who raises $5000 to be a “serious” candidate, but the realities of elections dictate differently.
It’s interesting that we so often emphasize how “our (the average person’s) voices count”, but a man such as Colbert, who has a substantial following, was completely blown off by his own party. It really emphasizes for me how the intentions of our Constitution and laws are often trumped by the realities of politics.
The MTV article simply reports this as straight news and includes a little background on laws governing presidential campaigns as well as some quotes from Colbert and other people. Other articles, such as this one
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7074694.stm
from the BBC, included less straight info and more opinion quotes, especially from the members of the committee which rejected Colbert.
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2 comments:
You are right that the first article contains more information than the second one. The one thing that stood up for me from the first article is this line "he ultimately went with the Democrats because the fee to file for the Republican Party was $35,000, versus the Dem's $2,500." Can he change his party because of the fees? But still it's really sad that his party voted him out.
I think he made a bad choice. He should be done other achievement, before he runs for the president. Why there is a huge gap of fees between Democratic and Republican Party? And If he changed his party because of fee, then we can think him distrustful.
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