Nick Daley | Managing Editor

Barack Obama is the coolest candidate left in the U.S. presidential race. He’s young, handsome, and has admitted to smoking pot. Young adults can relate to him. But how much of a role does the “cool factor” play in the U.S. presidential race?

Before I really get into this let me eliminate the possibility of people saying that I’m bashing Obama, being biased or favoring some candidates over others. They all have their flaws.

Romney’s only claim to fame is the Salt Lake City Olympics. McCain is ancient and in bad health. Huckabee is only fun to say. Hillary comes with Bill. And Barack is too young and only tells people what they want to hear.

But now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, we can get back to my point. Barack Obama is the most popular candidate among young people ages 18-25. However, I question if his support comes from his political views or from his “Mr. Cool” demeanor?

On Jan. 1 and 2, MySpace.com sponsored an online primary in which 153,226 users cast their votes on the eight early Democratic candidates. The idea was part of a youth-voting initiative and was designed to represent the “MySpace generation.” Obama won in a landslide, taking 46 percent of the vote to Hillary's 31 percent.

In this political race, we’re starting to see more and more candidates logging on to Facebook in attempts to gain the support of younger voters. Once a candidate has created a profile in Facebook, other users can “friend” them and become supporters. Currently, McCain and Romney have around 30,000 supporters, John Edwards had over 37,000, Hillary has over 80,000, and Barack…266,221 supporters. I guess it’s cool to be Facebook friends with Obama.

Now I’m not saying that everyone who supports Barack does so because they think he’s cool. That would be ignorant and untrue. But I do find it possible that many young people are not only picking him for his cool factor, but also for their own. Obama has become the bandwagon candidate of this primary race, and I strongly believe that some people have chosen to support him because their friends do.

Feel free to disagree with me, but I encourage you to think hard before you do. When Facebook groups like “Obama is poppin, Obama is cool” and “Go see Obama, You know he’s cool” exist, is it that far-fetched? Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, is the anti-cool, according to Facebook users. One group even calls itself, “Life’s a bitch, why vote for one?” - and has nearly 15,000 members!

About three weeks ago, an anonymous adviser for Hillary told The Guardian, a weekly UK newspaper, what they felt the difference was between Clinton’s supporters and the Obama-faithful. The adviser said, “If you have a social need, you're with Hillary, if you want Obama to be your imaginary hip black friend and you're young and you have no social needs, then he's cool.”

Now before you get Al Sharpton on the phone, I’d like to share with you a few posts that I found on a Yahoo Answers page. Users were responding to the question, “Just how cool is Barack Obama?” All of these comments were given within the last month.

- "OMG! He is COOOOL. I love him. He is hot too..."
- “I'm 15. If I could vote I would vote for Barack Obama. He is cool. I'm tired of older people talking about religion. Get over it."
- “He is cool and smart enough to be our next president.”

In all fairness, there were those who responded negatively to this question. One person even made the enlightening comment that The Rock is cool too, but they wouldn’t vote for him. Good point. But the fact that answers like the ones above were even posted has to make you wonder about young voters in this country.

But please do not take my opinions out of context. Barack Obama is a gifted speaker, fine politician, and a viable candidate to win the Democratic nomination. My only plea is that you take the time to consider each and every candidate’s political views. Vote solely on their ability to lead this country – not for how “cool” they are, and not for the approval of your friends.

Even though it is your right to vote for whomever you want and for whatever reasons, take my words into consideration. Look beyond the witty comments thrown around in debates. Get past the pictures of Obama’s beach bod on the cover of People magazine. Forget that he danced with Ellen DeGeneres on her show back in October (Watch). None of that is going to have an impact in the White House or on this country.

If you can ignore all of that, and you still support Obama because you think he is the right man for America, then good for you. Vote for him. My bet is he’d do a fine job. But if any of you started to question yourselves throughout my column, maybe you should take a deeper look into why you support the candidate you support. Ultimately, in the end, it’s your choice. Just make sure it’s an educated one.

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