Contributed by Huhnkie Lee
Greetings Sirs/Ma’ams, this is Huhnkie Lee who is running for US Senate 2022 as an independent, unaffiliated candidate.
I used to be a Republican, and I learned a great deal from Republicans. Then, I realized it’s time to graduate from Republican school of thoughts after three years of learning from them. It’s like, teachers stay in school as they need to teach next generations of students, but students leave school after graduation. It’s like, children grow up and leave their parents to see the bigger world out there. It was about time for me to leave one of my parental figures, the Alaska Republican Party, who taught me well.
About 55% Alaskans are Independent, 25% are Republicans, 15% are Democrats, and 5% partake other parties like Veteran’s Party, AIP, etc. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Alaska#Parties_and_registration.
A typical party-affiliated candidate may say in her/his campaign advertisement, “As a US Senator, I will represent Alaska in Washington DC.” Well, I do not think that is a truthful statement. A Republican candidate represents 25% of Alaskans, because only 25% of Alaskans are Republicans. A stereotypical party-affiliated candidate accepts 100% of the laundry list of the party’s platform. It is because s/he can’t get party support if s/he disagrees with the party’s ideological rules.
For instance, to run for an office as a Democrat, a candidate must believe in pro-LGBT-ism, pro-life-ism, anti-gun-ism, open-border-ism, etc. To run for an office as a Republican, a candidate must subscribe to post-Jan-6-pro-trump-ism, pro-life-ism, America-First-ism, etc. In sum, a party-affiliated candidate is as good as a parakeet, who’s only known vocabulary is “Yes”. A party candidate says yes to everything that the party requires her/him to say. That’s how President Obama was, that’s how President Trump was, that’s how President Biden is. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to America’s Political Puppetry Show, the greatest show on earth!
When I ran for the Republican Primary for Alaska State Senate in District D (Greater Wasilla Area) last year of 2020, 110 kind and generous citizens voted for me. I am eternally grateful to the kind voters. Of course, I ended up in the last place, but I don’t see it as a loss, as I gained everything. I met wonderful people during my campaign trails, whom I would not have met but for the campaign. I learned wisdom and knowledge from the voters, political activists and local politicians. It was like a political schooling.
So, the incumbent gentleman won the primary by the margin of about 400 votes more that the first runner-up. Some losing candidates’ supporters came to me and said, “You stole our votes. We lost because of you. Next time, do not run. You won’t win. You will only cause us to lose.” Of course, I’m dramatizing, exaggerating the plaintive comment greatly. But I did hear that kind of comment from others once again, after I declared my candidacy for 2022 US Senate.
Let us mathematically analyze whether such accusation is correct. In the 2020 Primary Election, I got about 100 votes, the winner got about 1700 votes, the first runner-up got about 1400 votes. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Alaska_Senate_election.
Let’s kindly assume that all the kind 100 voters who voted for me would have voted for the first runner-up, had I not run in the 2020 Primary Election. Even then, the first runner-up would have gotten 1500 votes and would have still lost to the winner who got 1700 votes. We can see, the accusation against me had no mathematical soundness. This is what happens when a person gets angry and emotional, and s/his rationality gets paralyzed.
Now, let’s look forward. I intend to keep running for something every two years. Why? Every time I run for a public office, I will get more famous little by little. And such gradual increase in name recognition is my long-term political strategy, so that I would get elected at some point in the future.
Next, why do I want to get elected? Is it self-serving pursuit of glorious money, power and fame? Yes. I won’t deny it. Prestige and heightened social status, it’s a big motivator for any politicians to run and re-run, whether they admit it or not. Some people just can’t get enough attention and yes, I’m one of those Attention-Deficit-Disorder, an ADD case just like any politicians or entertainers out there.
Jokes aside, I believe a time will come when the nation needs to be united once again. In history, America, like any other countries, have gone through the cycle of division-unity-division-unity, ad infinitum. America has been divided for about 15 years. When will America start to unite again? That’s a question no human can answer. But when that time comes, the turning point, I want to be there as the nation’s leader; yes, as the President of the United States.
I am an ambitious man. In America, ambition is not only allowed but welcomed, because America values freedom, liberty and courage. I take it as my moral and ethical obligation on this planet earth, that I keep running, so that one day, I’d get there. Thank you.