By Brendan O’Reilly

If the 2008 presidential election were held today, whom would you vote for? Polls say most would pick John McCain or Rudolph Giuliani over Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. But with 21 months left until the general election, anything could happen, and probably will.

Whether an election prediction comes from a crystal ball or a national polling company, it should be taken with a grain of salt.

A CNN/WMUR poll of likely Republican voters has shown that McCain has led the primary race since February 2005, though in the past two years he dropped from 40 percent of likely voters to 28 percent. Giuliani has been right behind him the whole time, now lagging by only one percent, within the margin of error.

When Fred Siegel, a senior fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute, came to campus last April as part of the University’s Presidential Scholar series, he told political science students that McCain and Giuliani would be an unbeatable ticket. Polls are showing Siegel may have been right, as the front-running Republicans are shown to both have good chances of defeating Hillary Clinton in a head-to-head race. But the chances are slim-to-none that the presidential race will be a one-on-one match. Though America has a two-party system, third-party candidates like Ralph Nader and Ross Perot can still garner millions of votes, and maybe even turn the tide.

According to the Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll, 13 percent of Democrats, and an equal percent of Republicans want Nader to run in 2008. In the 2000 election, Nader was accused of being a spoiler, hurting Al Gore by pulling away liberal voters. Though according to the same poll, only 40 percent of Democrats still believe that Nader cost Gore the presidency.

Nader has said that he is considering running if the Democratic candidate is Clinton, or someone like her. He called the former First Lady, “just another bad version” of her husband. But rather than hurting Clinton, he may help her. The poll shows, if Nader is added to a match between the former New York City mayor and Clinton, Giuliani’s support wanes.

Now imagine a scenario in which a Conservative Party or far-right independent joins the race. Giuliani’s support among stanch Republicans will wane even more. His liberal views on abortion rights and same-sex unions will have Christian conservatives pulling the lever for a third-party instead of the Republicans.

This is all assuming the early front-runners win the nominations. Considering the primaries are so far away, this may not be a safe assumption.

In the 2004 race, the media portrayed Howard Dean as not only the front-runner among the Democrats, but a shoo-in for the nomination. After John Kerry took the New Hampshire primary and the Iowa caucus, that all changed. Kerry went on to win the nomination, despite the media’s early insistence that Dean was a lock.

The media has not learned from the past it seems. While Hillary Clinton leads in nationwide polls for the Democratic nomination, it is John Edwards who has lead polling in Iowa. (Now that former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack has dropped from the race, however, the numbers may change.) A win in the first caucus could give Edwards considerable momentum. Most likely it will not be enough of a push to give Edwards the nomination, but it will force people to reconsider Clinton’s chances. She is a comfortable distance ahead of Obama in a recent Zogby international poll, but pollsters did not mention Gore while listing possible candidates.

Though Gore has not indicated he is planning a presidential run, there is still plenty of time. And according to Rasmussen Reports, he stands a better chance than Clinton against both McCain and Giuliani.

Clinton has been credited with having amazing fundraising power. Her campaign’s bank account is good for intimidating other potential candidates from running, but it will not do much to sway voters. Clinton is the type of person that most Americans either love or hate. The amount of voters on the fence is negligible. She could spend a billion dollars on a ten-minute campaign advertisement during the Super Bowl, and her poll numbers would not rise.

Gore on the other hand, is not such a divisive figure. As many people have a favorable view of Clinton as they do Gore, and he still stands a chance of persuading many undecided voters.