Calling All Undecideds – Part II

This is my second installment of Why I Find the Republican Ticket Terrifying and Why I Think the Democratic Ticket Is Awesome. If you missed Part I, I recommend reading that first.

Onward!

Obama has passed a series of anti-violence, protection against sexual assault, and equal opportunity laws

These laws include provisions for:

• Increasing penalties for multiple domestic violence offenses – the more an offender does it, the worse it gets for them.
• Increasing penalties if a battery incident occurs in or near a women’s shelter – if a woman is in need of a shelter situation (presumably to escape domestic violence) it is comforting to know there is an extra deterrent for their attacker.
• Helping victims get help without compromising their job – Just imagine how awful it would be if you were a victim of domestic violence and during the course of trying to seek treatment, you were terminated from your job. Again, adding insult to injury.

He also passed several laws regarding sexual assault the help protect the victim and bring their attacker to justice, and passed a law in Illinois to give 330,000 more women protection from pay discrimination. Simply put: A woman with the same job and responsibilities as a man should get paid the same amount, not less simply because she is a woman. Hurrah!

Obama supports a woman’s right to choose

I believe having kids should be a choice. Flat out. If you don’t want children, you should not be forced to bear them anyway because archaic men in government tell you you must. Raising kids is a huge endeavor, one that, ideally, (future) parents should be prepared for before embarking on that journey.

If a woman accidentally becomes pregnant, I believe that choosing to continue or terminate that pregnancy is her choice. If she wants to keep the baby? Fine. She wants to put it up for adoption? Fine. She wants to terminate? Fine. I don’t believe anybody makes these decisions lightly.

What I appreciate most about Obama’s stance on this issue is his commitment to preventing unwanted pregnancies in the first place. Instead of screaming “ABSTINENCE!” and running away, he’s advocating education and funding for family planning.

Obama will cut taxes for you more than McCain will

CNN Money worked out dollar for dollar how your taxes would change under each administration. Turns out, if you are part of the middle class or lower, you will get around 3x the tax cut from Obama as you would from McCain. People who make an insane amount of money would see their taxes go up – personally, this makes sense to me as these are the people who can afford it.

Jason Furman, the new economic adviser for Obama’s campaign said, “And the McCain plan gives nearly one-quarter of its benefits to households making more than $2.8 million annually – the top 0.1%.” I see that and I think, “Seriously?” I want someone who will help more people than just the top 0.1% of the country. According to the IRS, 89% of Americans make less than $100,000 adjusted gross income annually – if you (like me and almost everyone else I know) make less than that annually, your taxes will go down under Obama.

Obama has not sold his soul to win the presidency

Lately, it seems like McCain will do absolutely anything to win, including running false advertisements claiming Obama wants to teach comprehensive sex-ed to kindergartners, when he was actually advocating teaching them how to avoid sexual predators.

McCain may be the only candidate who has ever gotten in trouble with FactCheck.org for quoting FactCheck.org.

Did he think no one would notice?

But McCain has concluded that a fact-based case about Obama isn’t enough to prevail in November. So he has chosen to smear his opponent with ridiculous claims that he thinks the American people are gullible enough to believe.
– To McCain, the Truth is Expendable

The McCain campaign has decided he can’t win if people knew the facts – that’s why he’s resorting to these lowball attacks full of blatant lies.

Obama’s VP Pick of Joe Biden showed strength and intelligence

Obama picked someone he knew would have his back and do a great job as president if he were somehow indisposed. I don’t know a ton about Biden, but I know where he stands on issues and I know he has decades experience in government. I trust him.

I do not trust McCain’s pick:

Palin didn’t know what the Bush doctrine was. She robotically mouthed ancient Bush propaganda lines about the “war on terror.” She casually said that we might go to war with Russia. She blandly handed over control of Iran policy to Israel, ignoring the fact that if Tel Aviv attacked Iran, U.S. troops located next door would almost certainly die as a result. She clumsily avoided answering any question for which she had not hastily memorized a stock answer. You could practically see her riffling through her mental cheat sheets.
– The culture war – It’s back!

Again, I find her terrifying. The casual attitude toward future wars is enough to put me off right there, and it makes me very suspicious of McCain’s mental faculties if he genuinely thinks she was a fantastic choice for the future of this country.

I believe Obama will be an actual agent of change

After months and months of Obama’s campaign promoting “change we can believe in” and succeeding, the McCain campaign decided to jump on the bandwagon.

The thing I don’t get, though, is how you can claim to be a “maverick” (oh how I hate that term now) and an agent of change when you have voted with Bush 90% of the time. THAT IS NOT CHANGE. That is four more years of the same. I don’t even know how he is getting away with trying to espouse this idea.

I saw on someone’s website recently the phrase, “Change is not a synonym for improvement.” This is true. However, right now our country is in shambles – the economy is crap, gas prices are horrible, people are losing their jobs left and right. I would say that right about now, “something different” would definitely be an improvement.

Obama is not in denial about the economy.

Faced with the government takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (mortgage lending companies), the faltering of Lehman Brothers (who have just declared bankruptcy), and the collapse of Merrill Lynch, McCain has described the economy as “fundamentally sound.”

From the article:

“Ladies and gentlemen, I could walk from here to Lansing, and I wouldn’t run into a single person who thought our economy was doing well — unless I ran into John McCain. … I don’t doubt that John cares. He just doesn’t think. He doesn’t think that we have any responsibility to help people who are hurting,” Biden said.

I want someone for president who wants to take responsibility to help people who are hurting. It’s obvious that the economy is tanking. Let’s do something about it!

Obama represents the sort of president I want

In 2004, 57% of Americans would rather have had a beer with George W. Bush than John Kerry. Experts call this the “likeability factor” – regardless of qualifications, there is usually one candidate that you just “like” more, or identify with more.

The peculiar thing is that this only applies to politics: Voters who would not dream of taking their car to an incompetent mechanic or their body to an unlicensed physician have no problem electing totally unqualified candidates to perform the most difficult and important job in the world, simply because they identify with them.
– The culture war – It’s back!

I hold the opinion that the President of the United States should be someone that we can look up to, be proud of, like, and admire. He or she should be damn smart. I don’t want someone running this country because they look like they could drink a beer, I want someone running this country because they know what they’re doing.

For what this means is that anyone with expertise, unusual intelligence, mastery, special knowledge, is likely to be rejected by voters who are resentful of “elites.”

With all due respect, I would venture to say that someone who doesn’t even know how many houses he owns is more elitist than a community organizer who happens to be Ivy-league educated. And when it comes to presidents, what is so bad about being elite? If you are elitist, that is one thing, but being part of the elite is prestigious! It’s something to strive for! American Heritage Dictionary defines it as, “The best or most skilled members of a group.” THAT IS WHO I WANT FOR PRESIDENT.

Conclusion

I know that I have probably missed several important topics in both posts – I’m aware this is not totally comprehensive. I’m basically just trying to lay out my feelings in hopes that I can help the cause for Obama. I really and truly believe with every fiber of my being that he should be our next president. I feel much stronger about this right now than I did when I voted for John Kerry four years ago, and when I was too young to vote for Al Gore eight years ago. If you are currently undecided or planning on voting for McCain, I implore you to reconsider your position and to consider voting for Barack Obama.

I would be willing to chat with anybody more about my feelings on this subject if you are so inclined.

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