YouTube: the presidential election X Factor

YouTube this week announced You Choose '08, where voters can find the official and unofficial Web videos from a host of presidential candidates, including Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John McCain and John Edwards. Most of the videos are of the official variety but there are a fair number of the ones that the candidates would probably not like you to keep watching. For example, Sen. Hillary Clinton's off-key "Star-Spangled Banner", John Edwards prepping his hair for a TV appearance, John McCain sleeping (there's also a classic of Sen. Ted Kennedy sleeping during one of President George Bush's speeches and of course Howard Dean's rant that likely cost him the Democratic nomination in 2004). According to a Washington Post report today, all of the presidential front-runners (Clinton, former New York mayor Giuliani), even the long shots (Rep. Dennis Kucinich, Sen. Joe Biden), maintain their own YouTube channels, filling them with clips from their own Web sites. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has the most videos posted: 25. Sen. Obama's channel is the most watched, with total views of nearly 50,000.