I do feel the need to come to her defense about one thing. I was listening to the radio on the way into work this week, and I heard countless calls for Hillary to step down. “She’s out of Money,” “she needs to bow out gracefully,” “she’s got less of a chance of being the choice in the general election,” “She should be doing what’s best for her party.” Throughout the day, these calls for resignation were echoed on television, newspapers, blogs and other media outlets. I’ll be the first to admit that Hillary’s chances aren’t great at the moment, and sure, it’s costing money, time, and energy that could better serve building munitions for the upcoming battle with the Republican Nominee. Also, comparing herself to a teabag in this day and age was probably not a good idea, since anyone under 30 probably snickers when they hear the word “teabag”.

But the truth is, she has every right to continue.

This constant hammering that she gets from all sides has to stop. Do we want the kind of people running for our presidency who are going to bow out? Someone who is going to say, “the odds are stacked pretty high against me, gee, I think I should just quit”? I know I don’t. I want someone crazy. Like Ron Paul. Someone who is so convinced that they have something to say that needs to be heard that they don’t care if the world thinks they are crazier than a loon. I want someone who will stare into the camera, brow furrowed, head cocked with the crazy eyes when you ask them about dropping out.

To me, a “never say die” spirit represents some of the ideals attributed to our great nation as much as a smooth-talking optimist (no, I’m not talking about myself, I’m referring to Obama) does. We live in a world of instant gratification where anything not had easy isn’t worth having, and this continued insistence that Hillary just give up is a perfect indicator of that. If I had the slightest snowball’s chance of being the leader of the free world, do you think I would give it up? Never. I would fight with every thread of my being at that slender chance of getting the nomination. Selfish? Get used to it. We are human beings. We are self-interested. Manners are a social contract and an evolutionary adaptation that allow us to not kill one another. But that applies to little things like splitting the last cookie or allowing someone to cut you off so you don’t cause a 40-car pile up and die. This is the presidency, folks. Anyone who has a chance to win all the marbles, has it all on the line, is millions in debt and drops out right before a contest she is bound to win (WV) is stupid.

At the very least, if Hillary drops out now, she’s got some dignity after a recent win in West Virginia. Personally, I’ve never left West Virginia with any dignity, but that’s because I’m fond of canoing down rivers while I’m there (cue banjo solo).

But anyway, the point is, people need to get off of Hillary’s back. I think she’s a shameful, pandering politician, but at the same time, I think there’s a good chance that Obama’s like that guy with the guitar at the college party — you know the one, pretending he’s all sensitive and introverted while he has 2 pending date rape convictions? No, I’m not saying he’s a sex pervert, only that I’m guessing he’s not as dreamy and idealistic as we think he is. If she wants to continue to mire herself in debt to accomplish a pretty lofty goal, that’s her prerogative.

We have a short time on this planet to make a big impression, and Hillary is in the latter half of that trip. If the presidency was within your reach — maybe unlikely, but palpable — wouldn’t you go all in to try and make it happen? Seriously sit and think for a minute. Would you be the selfless one who gave up being the first female president because everyone told you to roll over for Senator McDreamy?

I am mainly inspired to write this based on what I saw the other day on CNN. I was laying in bed, with a box of tissues next to me (I have a cold), and nearly soiled myself when I saw that Ralph Nader is going to run for President again. Yes, that’s right, Ralph Nader. In the 2000 election, he did pull in over 3 million votes, the largest ever for the Green Party, and the largest in 75 years for a progressive independent candidate. The majority of the popular vote went to Al Gore, while the electoral college elected G.W. Bush. Some claim the Nader’s votes came from Al Gore’s base, causing him to lose. Whether this is true or not is way beyond relevancy now.

In 2004 Nader ran again, as an Independent. Wait a second, he was running with the Green Party in 2000, what happened? Simply put, the Green Party gave Nader the boot. In 2004, he came no where near the million vote mark. So here we are in 2008, less than a year before all go to the polls and Nader peeks his head out again. He isn’t happy with any of the candidates, he says, so he is going to run. First of all, if everyone who wasn’t happy with their choices did that, we would have thousands of people running for office (if they had the money that is). Ok, Ralph, here it is straight from me to you. Give it up. You’ve tried it before and you failed. You were such a disgrace to the Green Party that they kicked you out. That is not easy to do. I mean, who else gets kicked out of the Green Party. It’s not like the party is overcrowded and needs to make room. So take the hint, don’t run for President. You don’t need to be President to make a difference in the world, go do some relief work, join the Peace Corps, build a house with Jimmy Carter, but please, don’t turn what is almost an actual Presidential race into a farce… again.

Now Nader is far from the only person in this race that doesn’t make any sense. Mike Huckabee just seems to be in this for fun now, although his campaign manager would probably disagree with me. After McCain cleaned house on Super Tuesday on the Republican side, Mitt Romney suspended his campaign (suspended, not ended which from I understand means he still holds all of his delegate votes), and Mike Huckabee did better than he thought he would. During his speech that night, he was in shock that he even won a state. A Presidential Candidate in shock about winning. If you’re running for President of the U.S., don’t act surprised when you win something. What happens if he makes it into the White House? "I can’t believe I’m here, this is amazing. Hello? Yes God? Push the red button? With pleasure."

If this didn’t make me laugh at him enough, his weekend appearance on SNL made me just scratch my head. Right there on a COMEDY show, they pointed out how he can not mathematically win the nomination. His response to this on CNN today? Well, he claims that he might not be able to win the nomination based on delegates, but he can prevent McCain from winning based on delegates, which will lead to the moment where they will have to vote at the actual convention. Now, if memory serves me right, the last time we had conventions where they chose the candidate that night, there were riots on the streets.

So Mr. Huckabee, go home, please. You’re causing McCain to waste money campaigning against you. This is money that he could be saving to battle the Democratic monster that is on fire right now. You claim you’re in this to help your party, well it seems to me that you aren’t helping at all.. So please, go home.

This leads me to Mr. McCain. Oh poor McCain. Did someone lose their grandfather? I have a lost old man over here. The plus side to McCain is that he does have the most experience out of all the candidates. If he does get the nomination for his party (which I’m pretty sure he will) I think he needs to pick a really good, and young, running mate. Sure, the older republican base might not have a problem voting for someone their own age, but younger people might. He has already had one illness, who says he won’t have more. With him as Commander-in-Chief, he needs to make sure and pick a good back up, just in case. Up until two weeks ago, his campaign was going well, and then the New York Times reveals a scandal of that you would usually associate with Bill Clinton. Apparently he had an affair with a woman. If you’ve seen pictures of this woman, there is no way the two of them were having any kind of affair unless it involved taking care of his rash. And then in this past week he is being accused of campaign finance something or other. I didn’t create these finance laws, I don’t anything about them, but McCain does. In fact, the law that he’s breaking is apparently one that he helped create! McCain, buddy, grandpa, just keeping walking forward. Don’t worry about Huckabee. Just worry about making it to the bathroom on time. And if anyone challenges you to see who can raise their hand faster, don’t worry about beating them, just make sure you have something good in your hand when you do raise. Maybe a sandwich, or a drink.

Now for Clinton and Obama. Yes, I think I can group these two together. For the first time in American history, the Democratic nominee will either be a Black Man (who is half white) or a woman (who is kind of mannish). Well, this is sad. Not sad that it is happening, but sad that it has taken this long for it to happen. It is the year 2008, and this is WAY over due. But I digress. Now, I didn’t catch all of their debate last week, but I did see the very end. First of all they were sitting really close to each other, and at the end they stated how good of friends they were. Isn’t that nice? They are good friends. They are such good friends that Hillary said this to Obama over the weekend. "Shame on you Obama, shame on you." Wait, that doesn’t sound friendly at all. It reminds me of high school really. When you are together, you just talk about how much you enjoy each other, and what great friends you are. Then as soon as you are hanging with your own friends you back-stab that person like no tomorrow. So Hillary, Obama, why can’t we really get along? Stick to your strengths and don’t bash the other like you have been doing. People aren’t blind, they can see when you give them a hug one day, and knife in the back the next. And if you back stab "your friends" how can people trust you enough to vote for you with out thinking "what if he/she back stabs me?"

My straight talk to the democrats: aside from everything that I have already said, Obama, stay positive, it is your strength. People like you because sometimes you sound like as though you have faith like a child. You really believe everything you say, and that is a refreshing thing to hear. And don’t be afraid to put your wife out their more; who cares if in some areas, people are still afraid of a Black Woman that is smarter than them. And Hillary, dude, I mean girl, keep your daughter at home. Bill is a good public speaker, he could shoot someone in front of the cops and convince them that he didn’t do it. But your daughter, she didn’t get the gene. I’ve seen clips of her speaking, and she seems unsure about herself. This isn’t what you need to win. Let her go back and work for hedge fund which you want to put out of business.

Those are my thoughts on the current crop of jokers that are the “Main Eventers” of this presidential race. What are yours? Sound off below, but lets keep it respectful.