"My brother Bob doesn't want to be in government -- he promised Dad he'd go straight"-John Fitzgerald Kennedy. It's not whether or not the system can meet the needs of America, rather, why it does not - the politicians. The American political system cannot meet the needs of the American people because the right people are not elected to office. The right people are not elected to office because they are usually new to politics, which means they start at the bottom as underdogs. As underdogs they need to run against wealthy politicians who build their campaigns on gold foundations, or ones who use dirty politics and mudslinging to divert attention from issues. They also need to fight the two party system that prevents alternative ideas from being expressed.

One of the most difficult obstacles to overcome for new politicians is gathering the financing necessary to run a successful campaign. Finding backers for new politicians is an extremely difficult task. They have little or no political past for their financial supporters to "back," and without strong ties to their party, they are not necessarily going to receive campaign funds from one of th

Another problem that new politicians and good politicians alike are faced with is dirty politics. Campaigns based on mudslinging and finger pointing are becoming more and more popular. When someone with a good track record in local or state government, and an image as a person who really is there for the people, is running for an office, incumbents seek to destroy this person at all costs. When they realize that they can't win fairly, they resort to dirty tactics. Whether it be to dig up all of the person's life for the smallest blemish, or to slam them with negative television advertisements, there can be some way, other than battling over the issues, to prevent this person from taking the incumbents job. And it's not always the incumbent leader who has to resort to these tactics. When the office, or seat is open, often one candidate will show himself or herself as being willing to stoop to these levels in order to prevent the other candidate from being elected. Take for instance, the epitome of dirty politics. With less than one week less before the Presidential election, news of a GOP candidate George W. Bush's DUI conviction of more than 20 years prior is leaked into the press. Within one week of hitting headlines, it was found that the Democratic Party was directly associated to the DUI information being leaked into the media. Another instance of dirty politics was when Gore had cartons of cigarettes handed out to Tennessee homeless in effort to have them fill out absentee ballots. This is a blatant attempt to buy Tennessee's homeless voters. Then there is the culmination of Gore's dirty campaign. Days before the election, after realizing he may win the Electoral College but not the popular vote, Gore was quoted in the USA Today. Gore told reporters "it doesn't matter who wins the popular vote, the Constitution says whoever wins the Electoral College should be the President." Now, after Gore has won the popular vote, but may not win the Electoral College vote, Al Gore has begun to file lawsuits to try to find a 'backdoor' to the White House, contradicting himself since things didn't go his way. One of these possible backdoors is the Palm Beach County scandal, which was revealed to have been created by the Gore campaign. According to the Associated Press, "Faced with a cliff-hanger election, the Democratic Party directed a telemarketing firm on election night to begin calling thousands of voters in Palm Beach County, Florida to raise questions about a disputed ballot and urge them to contact local election officials." The problem in Palm Beach County was a supposed confusion over whether they had punched the hole for the candidate they wished to vote for. Democrats said that people mistakenly voted for Pat Buchanan, when they meant to vote for Al Gore. The ballot, known as the butterfly ballot, is used in many other counties across America, including 15% of Illinois Counties, where they have yet to complain of any problems (Chicago Tribune; November 10, 2000). It is not possible for the ri

Some common words found in the essay are:
Hillary Clinton, Kennedy It's, Tribune November, Agricultural Reform, Democratic Party, Farmers Congress, Goldman Sachs, Republicans Democrats, Democratic Republican, Ross Perot, american people, dirty politics, people elected, elected office, political system, white house, divert attention issues, popular vote, electoral college, office unlikely, own money, american political system, palm beach county, people elected office, elected office unlikely,
Approximate Word count = 2046
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)