It’s the first time since 1928 that the presidential election is free of incumbents. For the first time ever, four different candidates have emerged victorious in Iowa and New Hampshire. The playing field is more open now than it has been in recent memory. For the Democrats, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are the two primary candidates. For the Republicans, Mitt Romney, John McCain, Mike Huckabee and Rudy Giuliani all have legitimate shots at the nomination (sorry Ron Paul fanatics).

Time and time again, the media has told us just how important this election is, just like they do for every single election. Except this time, they’re actually right. The country stands at a rare crossroads in which this year, 2008, is a convergence of a multitude of issues that are all equally important.

Gone is the grandstanding and exaggeration of social issues such as banning homosexual marriage that the Republican party fell prey to in 2004, and the single-mindedness with which the Democratic party pursued its Iraq war agenda in the same year.

Candidates are not simply divided between being pro-war and anti-war, or pro-life and pro-choice. Instead, they are becoming the embodiment of belief systems, systems that would all radically change the political landscape of the country.

Obama brings his inspiring message of hope to the field, encouraging Americans that their problems are not insurmountable. Criticisms have been made, and will continue to be made, about his lack of experience, but such qualms are, for his supporters, relatively unimportant. His message, his youth and his ideas are what have been bringing increasingly large numbers of people to his side (despite his defeat in New Hampshire), not his role in passing so-and-so number of bills in the Senate.

Clinton is, despite being similar to Obama on several issues (all depending on which constituencies Clinton’s pandering to), the old workhorse, running on experience that she gained while her husband was President and while she sat in the Senate waiting for her chance to run for the position on her own.

One of the most important differences between Obama and Clinton isn’t, say, their health care plan, but instead their mentality. Clinton and her contemporaries are still stuck in the culture wars of the 60s, still shackled to the baby-boomer ideologies that have split the country in two between those who sympathized with the liberal movement and those who went along with Nixon and Reagan in the culture wars. Obama is free of the scars the culture wars have left, giving him a different outlook, one that will prove to either be the cause of his victory or his glaring weakness.

As for the Republicans, as numerous as they are, the race is even more peculiar than its Democratic counterpart.

In one corner, there’s McCain, the ancient (as he’s keen to joke about) ex-maverick who lost in the 2000 primaries and has since been gravitating towards the far right. He’s running on the strange mix of a continuation and expansion of George W. Bush’s foreign policy, along with a more liberal stance on the environment and immigration.

Whereas McCain follows after Bush’s mentality in regards to Iraq, Huckabee seeks to follow after Bush’s religious attitudes and then some. Whether he’s advocating turning the United States into a Christian nation under Jesus, or telling Iran that it will see the gates of Hell, Huckabee has been inserting his past as a Baptist preacher into his campaign (even if one is to ignore the notorious “phantom cross”). Huckabee is now a national contender after his win in Iowa, and seeks to reinvigorate a religious right that feels betrayed by the Bush administration after it backed out of its 2004 campaign promises.

Romney and Giuliani both have similar advantages and weaknesses. Both have to re-invent themselves as red-blooded Republicans after working in primarily Democratic states and having enacted rather liberal policies on issues such as healthcare and immigration. Romney’s massive stores of cash have helped him until this point, but after being a presumed front-runner who has won neither Iowa nor New Hampshire, his campaign is struggling to gain initiative.

As for Giuliani, after basically ignoring Iowa and New Hampshire, his campaign is in desperate need of a spark to help it last until the primaries in the likes of Florida and California, where most of its attention has been paid.

In the months to come, expect the typical Washington tricks and deception to become even more intense. The primaries are often compared to a horse race but this year, they’re a gladiatorial free-for-all, battled with an intensity and importance that would scare off even the biggest of “American Gladiator’s” steroid jockeys.

Columnist: Morgan Little - 01/16/07