Presidential Primaries - The First Last Word

by Kussmich Imarsche, IbK News Political Correspondent

The results are in from the first Presidential primaries and the entire nation - Republican and Democrat alike - have lifted their voices to cry out in unison an empassioned "Whoop-De-Shit!"

You'd think with the tens of millions in campaign funds spent, demographics analyzed, town halls addressed, farmers polled, doors knocked upon, hands kissed and babies shaken that we would have half a stinking idea where we're going and who we're going with in this Presidential choosery-thingie... but not so much. So far we've had two parties run five contests in three states with five different winners. Iowa went to Huckabee and Obama, Wyoming to Romney, and New Hampshire to McCain and Clinton. How could this happen and what does it all mean?

First question first.

To begin with, each political party runs its primary system entirely differently. Democrats have over 4000 delegates of which the winner must get one more than half; Republicans just under 2400. Democratic caucuses allow for (and actually count) second choices; Republicans make no time for backups. 186 Democratic delegates have been awarded in states that haven't voted yet; Republicans have similarly pledged only six. For crying out loud - they don't even vote in the same states at the same time: Republicans are already done in Wyoming, and the Dems are still trying to find it on the map (No, Dennis... that's Colorado - Wyoming is the other big-ass rectangle in the West.)

On the subject of states, let us look closer at the states which have cast their ballots in this primary season already to get a gauge as to how representative they may be of the country as a whole: Iowa is a state which manages to rank in the top five in the nation in both average education level and pork production per capita. New Hampshire is settled by a fiercely independent and well-armed hearty woodland folk of which over 95% are Caucasian, thus earning it the title New England's Idaho. Wyoming is... well... the big-ass Western rectangle that isn't Colorado. Pretty easy to see how Floridians and left-coasters could be scratching their heads over the results so far, what?

As far as what it means: Bollocks. Looking at the delegate scorecard, Hillary Clinton leads the Democrats at 183 with Barack Obama a distant second with 78, but Obama leads Clinton in earned delegates (those determined by the people's vote) 25 to 24. On the Republican side, Mitt Romney leads the delegate race with 30, Mike Huckabee is second with 21, John McCain third with 10, yet Rudy Giuliani who has yet to earn a single delegate is considered one of the frontrunners. It makes about as much sense as eating a wallet full of umbrella piss, but such results arise from systems designed by ivory tower bureaucrats.

The upside to all this madness is that no matter where you live, the odds are pretty good your vote will still count. Nobody anywhere is even 10% of the way to a nomination - no Republican can even claim 3% - so it's still anybody's game. When it's your turn, be sure to get out and vote. Don't know who to vote for? Neither does anybody else, but that doesn't seem to stop them. Have fun with it... write your Mom in - the way this thing is playing out, she's got as good a chance as anybody else, so why the hell not?