Even though, we did not vote for him, he will be our President just the same and we wish him all the best for his term in office. With this we also mean that the political bickering in Washington D.C. will be reduced and that all elected officials will truly try and work together for the benefit of all the people in this country. Of course, there are differences of opinion as they should be but we always wondered why the differences had to lead and result in rancor and sometimes vicious personal attacks.

            But back to the Inauguration. The transfer of power of the Executive branch from President George W. Bush to President-Elect Barack Obama begins with the swearing into office of the latter. This will take place on the steps of the Capitol Building in the presence of hundreds of thousands of people and it is in its formality simple, yet such a powerful event due to its peaceful nature as anchored in the Constitution of this country. The fact that the loser of the Presidential election, Senator John McCain will be sitting close by while this swearing-in ceremony is taken place speaks volumes about the power of Democracy. And we think it is something to cherish and behold.

            While Barack Obama can be envied for having won the election, he also deserves our common sympathy because he is entering the Presidency at a time when things are tough on almost all fronts. While we are winding down the war in Iraq, we are apparently ramping up the conflict in Afghanistan by adding troops there and the overall war on terror is still going strong. We have to remain alert for potential future terrorist attacks. The Middle East and particularly the current war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza strip is of major concern to everybody and the possible threat of Iran becoming a nuclear power is a continuous problem. Couple that with the current economical and financial situation not only nationwide but worldwide and we have to come to one conclusion:  From Day One of his Presidency, Mr. Obama’s plate is full!

            It is our sincere hope that he will be given a chance by everybody to adjust to this new job and get familiar with the full scope this job encompasses. We wish that this will happen so that he does not have to deal with the additional burden of intense, instant criticism expressed in demeaning name-calling as it did happen with his predecessor George W. Bush. It was truly shameful how he was treated, calling him everything from being stupid and just plain dumb to being a liar and even a murderer was abhorrent and disgusting. These statements were made not just by his ideological opponents in the media, the movie industry and among liberal bloggers but also by active members of Congress in both chambers. It was very difficult to take and understand for those who had voted for George Bush and believed in what he wanted to do for America. This total lack of civility on the part of Bush’s critics was a low point in American history.

            It is our sincere hope that a President Obama will never have to experience this kind of gutter attacks by his ideological opponents, we hope that criticism of him will remain factual and civil and not ever become so vile and personally insulting. Let us be realistic, whatever his decisions or plans for America, he will never be able to please everybody, that is a given. Yet, he will be the President and we only have one at a time!

Presidential Inauguration – A Grand Moment is a post from: Common Sense University

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Although Barack wasn’t our first choice, he was a decisive winner and will be our next President.  His issues were discussed in this blog, and are there to be judged against.  Common Sense Politics will not condemn Barack Obama because we have different beliefs, but will certainly hold him to his words, as are included in many of the articles here.  We would hope that those that voted for him will hold him to this same standard, doing what you said.

It would be easy to criticize him and his policies, but, as said, we will hope for the best, and hope that the campaign showed him many issues that many Americans want addressed.  Although his past may show otherwise, he will soon be President of the United States, and that commands a different level of compassion and values for its constituents.  The advisors he chooses should help with this, but time will tell.

This site will continue with political analyses at times, but plans on moving toward another theme that revolves around common sense education.  A possibility would be to investigate common sense thoughts for their validity and use it to help teach kids to not take things at face value, but consider several sources of information and arrive at their own conclusion using common sense.

Congratulations again to President-Elect Barack Obama!  We hope your presidency unites Americans while keeping its constitutional values. In your acceptance speech, you promised to be the President to all Americans and we sincerely hope you meant those words. This would require consideration from more than one ideological point of view when new programs are proposed and eventual become law.

Congratulations to President-Elect Obama is a post from: Common Sense University

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            So then, who is it going to be and what will be the consequences? In our opinion, a victory by Senator Barack Obama coupled with an increase of Democrats in the House of Representatives and the United States Senate will clearly be a turn to the proverbial ‘Left’. We will see larger government in the next few years and attempts by the Democrats to ‘spread the wealth around’ and reducing the military. We are not guessing here, we have heard them say it; Barack Obama has said numerous times that spreading the wealth around is good for America and Representative Barney Frank from Massachusetts said recently that he would like to cut the military budget by 25 percent. That is scary, to say the least. Such a reduction in military spending would severely impact our national security; it would have to mean ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan quickly without reasonable rationale. In other words, withdrawal of troops without logic, it would mean retreat instead of pursuit of victory.

            What would an election victory by John McCain mean for America? To Common Sense Politics it would certainly mean trustworthy experience in the White House from Day One; it would mean more certainty of what will happen under a McCain Presidency. He has stated repeatedly that he wants to cut Government spending and in view of a recession will not raise taxes. From Economics 101 we should all know that raising taxes during a recession will be the worst thing anybody can possibly do and we know how Democrats love to tax and the higher they are, the taxes, the better they like them! Another benefit of a McCain Presidency would be the presence of a Veto Pen in the White House and therefore represents the existence (and continuation) of “Checks and Balances” in the Federal Government.

            Speaking strictly on experience, the gap could not be wider between the two Presidential contenders. While Barack Obama’s political star has been rising very speedily, his resume of accomplishments is rather empty. How could it not be? He has been on the national stage a mere four years since his election to be a United States Senator from Illinois and since he has spent half this time running for President. The list of his actual senatorial accomplishments is very short and his votes have all been rather liberal and not bi-partisan. Compared to that, John McCain has been in Congress since 1983, the first few years as Congressman and since 1987 as Senator from Arizona and has a long record of being bi-partisan and has been called a ‘maverick’ for his independent stances on controversial votes. He has been in the service of the United States a total of 55 years when one includes his military service.

            It appears though that large voter groups, among them especially the younger generation, look at the world totally different today in that they like instant stardom as it is created annually in the ‘American Idol’ contests. Are they seeing that in Barack Obama? We here tend to believe it and yet they have a right to vote just like anybody else who is a citizen of America. While we all might be in for a long evening tomorrow, early East coast States results could project the ultimate winner within a few hours after the polls close there. Should so-called ‘red’ States Florida, North Carolina and Virginia (with 55 electoral college votes) be declared for Barack Obama early, it would be impossible for John McCain to become President. On the other hand, if these three States together with Pennsylvania (a total of 76 electoral college votes) will be ‘declared too close to call’ well into the evening, McCain could be the winner once all the votes are counted. But as we stated above by quoting Yogi Berra, “it ain’t over ‘til it’s over!” Therefore, we will wait!

What is it going to be, America? is a post from: Common Sense University

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            As to his career, it appears that he succeeded in achieving goals when he set his mind on them. When he decided to go into politics, he knew how to go about it and he became a State Senator in Illinois in 1997. In 2004, he ran for United States Senator from Illinois and he won on an ‘Anti-War’ platform. He was sworn in as Senator in January 2005 and merely two years later, he announced his intentions to run for President in 2008. It appears, that he applied for the next job shortly after he attained one and there is nothing wrong with being ambitious but it did not allow him to attain real experience. While his resume is impressive, his actual voting and achievement record is very slim. In the Illinois Senate he took the easy way out more than a hundred times by voting ‘present’ and in his few years in the U.S. Senate, he voted along party lines and is considered the most liberal Senator in the chamber. He showed little interest in being bi-partisan and rarely attempted to bring such legislation to the floor. But the one place where he was consistent was his anti Iraq War stance; he voted against the 2007 Iraq War surge and even voted to cut funding for the troop while they were fighting there. We find that very objectionable, being liberal and being partisan are things we can accept but to vote against funding the troops is abominable in our opinion. But he had great cover since many Democrats voted the same way and even though the military surge has succeeded, he cannot bring himself to this day to admit he was wrong about it initially.

            From the beginning of his run for President, he became a media darling and they have been his greatest assets throughout the Presidential campaign. He proposed “Change” and “Hope”. At first, it was ‘Change we can believe in’ which has now been revised to ‘Change we need’. The overwhelmingly liberal media in America ate this all up and have consequently been extremely negligent when it comes to checking on Barack Obama’s past; in particular his college years and his questionable associations in Chicago with people that can at best be described as dubious. While Obama sat in the pews of Trinity United Church of Christ for twenty years, he claims that he never heard the anti-American hate filled sermons of Reverend Jeremiah Wright; he worked for years with a former, yet unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers on education programs and who knows what else But to Mr. Obama, Ayers at first was just another guy in the neighborhood. Obama was wheeling and dealing for a time with a notorious and recently convicted real estate developer and slumlord Tony Rezko but he (Obama) had no involvement there we hear. While this might be true, we have to question Mr. Obama’s judgment as to the caliber and character of people he was friendly with. In the case of Rev. Wright, he has even referred to him as his spiritual advisor and mentor who also married the Obama’s and baptized their two daughters. Only after Wright became known nationwide for his hateful and anti American speeches did the Presidential candidate have to distance himself from the pastor. Yet he still maintains that he never heard these kind of speeches when he attended his sermons. We find this remarkable in that this and similar explanations have been accepted by the media and by all his supporters.

            When it became clear that Barack Obama would win the Democrat’s nomination for President, the liberal media went absolutely crazy over him and heaped praise on him that was becoming a Super star. From then on, whatever this candidate said was taken as gospel. When he changed positions and sometimes completely flip-flopped, the media provided complete cover for him and attacked anybody who would criticize such contradictions. We have to admit though, that over the months, Barack Obama has grown in his appearance and position, he has shown style and eloquence in his speeches and his campaign has been very well run and executed. His financial support has been record breaking and this has given him a tremendous advantage in his advertising abilities. He reportedly has outspend his opponents by a ratio of 4 to 1 and this has to have an impact on voters.

            We will not attempt here to list or discuss his policy proposals and recommend to visit his website instead http://www.barackobama.com/ to see details of his plans for the future of America. He has stated that he ‘wants to spread the wealth around’ as he told Joe the Plumber in Ohio a few weeks ago and he has since then stated publicly that he meant that. His proposed tax increases for the wealthy who make $250,000 or more per year is a promise that he could easily change once in office and we would not be surprised if he would come back next year and say that its not enough and that the taxation starts at $125,000 instead or even at a lower level. He would not be the first Democrat President to do so, Bill Clinton did the exact thing: He promised tax cuts for the middle class in 1992 and as President proposed and got through a Democrat Congress with Al Gore casting the tie-breaking vote in the Senate the biggest tax hike in recent history, including raising the taxable amount of Social Security benefits from 50% to the current 85%, effecting every Senior Citizen.

            Going back on campaign promises should not come as a surprise to anybody but we will have to wait and see if it will happen with Mr. Obama. Generally speaking, raising taxes of any sort on anybody during a recession is the dumbest thing to do as any economist or common sense will tell you. The other troubling element of Obama’s promise of cutting income taxes for 95 percent of Americans belongs to the most misleading promises ever made by a political candidate. Roughly 40 percent of income earners do not pay income taxes in America and he wants to give them a tax cut too (it could also be called ‘spreading the wealth around’). When asked, he said that they pay payroll taxes to which we say: Hello, payroll taxes are being paid for future Social Security benefits!

            As we did with John McCain in our previous article, we have to ask some questions that deserve some answers:

• Does Barack Obama have the experience to be President? The answer should be: Absolutely NOT!
• Does Barack Obama have good judgment and the right temperament to be President? We think he lacks good judgment but he might have the right temperament.
• Is Barack Obama therefore qualified to be President? We think Not!
• Will Barack Obama be a strong Commander-in-Chief? The answer is most likely: Absolutely NOT!
• Will Barack Obama be ready for this job on Day One? Again, we think: Absolutely NOT!
• Will Barack Obama be able to deal effectively with a crisis, domestic or international? In our opinion: Absolutely NOT!
• Does Barack Obama have substance or style or both? While he lacks substance, he does have style!
• Does Barack Obama have the integrity and character to be President? We believe: No!
• Would you trust Barack Obama on his promise to bring ‘Change we need’? We believe he will bring change but we question what change it will be and if we need it; we do not trust Mr. Obama!
• Would you let your kids hang around the people that have influenced Barack Obama?  Absolutely not!

We can only hope that the majority of voters ask themselves the above and similar questions for both candidates before they enter the voting booths on November 4, 2008.

A final look at…..Barack Obama is a post from: Common Sense University

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            As we all know now, one element on this list is voter registration and assisting voters to get to the voting booths on Election Day. While this might at first sound very admirable and praiseworthy, we question the need for it though when it is being done in such excessive ways as we have recently seen by the ACORN groups. There have reportedly registered over 1.3 million individuals for this election cycle and are now under investigation in several States for fraudulent registrations and will undoubtedly be very active on Election Day to make sure most of their newly registered voters will actually vote.

            ACORN is an acronym for Associations of Community Organizers for Reform Now and is allied with many civic groups and has over many years received millions of taxpayer dollars from the Federal and many State governments. While they claim to be non-partisan, they in fact are not! They have officially endorsed the Democrat’s candidate Barack Obama, a former fellow community organizer in Chicago who sort of returned the favor by sending them over $800,000 for get out the vote efforts. ACORN has registered approximately 600,000 new voters in Ohio alone of which 200,000 were found to be very questionable. When the Ohio Republican Party challenged these registrations, the Democrat Ohio Secretary of State, Ms. Jennifer Brunner ignored them. We only focus on Ohio since George Bush won this State’s electoral votes in 2004 over John Kerry by a mere 120,000 votes. A switch of 60,000 votes could have made John Kerry President. When there are now 200,000 questionable registrations, voter registration fraud leading to voter fraud could very well swing this election.

            We here at Common Sense Politics are very concerned that our election process is now so flawed and compromised by fraudulent activities that the results are criminally tinged. We have a very clear position on this: Make active voter registration illegal! With this we are coming back to our opening sentence that we yearn for the good old days. We have a very hard time accepting that there are millions of citizens in America that do not care enough to make the effort to be a registered voter by contacting their respective County Registrar’s office by phone, mail or visiting the offices in order to exercise this precious right, to have a voice in elections by voting. These people are being referred to in the media and many liberals as being disenfranchised and therefore need help in becoming registered and to vote. To this we say: That is just plain nonsense, yet if true, that’s tough! We refuse to believe that a legal citizen of America who has gone through an education process called K-12 is incapable of registering to vote by him or herself and is therefore not disenfranchised but simply does not care enough to register to vote. As a consequence, we also question that person’s mental capability to think for him or herself and should possible refrain from voting. We do not want to insult such a person by calling them stupid but we have to question the basic attitude of such people when they have to depend so totally on active voter registration operations like ACORN.  Think of the outcry if an alcohol company took everyone turning 21 to a bar on their birthday and paid for their drinks.  Shouldn’t our pick for President be as important?

            If a young person turns 18, should we not expect this young person to decide for him or herself whether or not to partake in an election and then exercise his right to become a voter actively? And if the decision to sit this one out for lack of interest or for other reasons, so be it, but let us not refer to them as disenfranchised individuals, that is clearly lacking any common sense. At the same time, we also reject the charges by liberals, Democrats and the majority of the media that Republicans are guilty at every election of voter suppression. We do not understand how this can happen other than assuming that when a voter shows up at a voting place and is not allowed to vote because he or she is not on the official voting rolls. They are still being given so called ‘provisional ballots’ to be verified for accuracy at a later time. If it is ‘voter suppression’ when an election official at a polling place does his or her job by verifying a person’s registration, then we might as well do away with any rules and accept ‘anything goes’ from now on. If long lines at polling places are interpreted as voter suppression, how can that be the fault of Republicans?  We cannot believe that we are even writing about this nonsense. The only kind of ‘voter suppression’ we can accept – and we say this humorously – is when a Republican tells a Democrat voter that they are supposed to vote on the next day. In other words: Republicans vote on November 4 while Democrats vote on November 5. But this is of course of not happening anywhere other than as part of a prank or a joke.

            In conclusion, we are very concerned that this Presidential election on November 4 might be so effected by fraudulent activities by ‘Get-Out-the-vote’ drives by all groups who are participating in this. Unfortunately, we will never truly know how many fraudulent votes will be cast on or before November 4 and will simply have to accept the overall results for lack of proof that fraud was a major factor for the winner. But in about ten days this year’s election will be over and we hope it is as clean as possible.

Will Voter Fraud swing this election? is a post from: Common Sense University

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Newt finally mentioned what those of us that think have wanted to hear for some time.  Senator McCain needs to find opportunities for these words too, but to a larger audience.  Rather than orchestrating what people see about our presidential candidates, the Main Stream Media needs to report the news that we need to know, and let us elect our president.  Bad things have happened when a country’s media has determined such an outcome.

Newt Gingrich asked about Palin’s Experience is a post from: Common Sense University

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Wow!  Every American should listen to this message.  We don’t hear about this from our main-stream media, do we?  Although it would make sense for American media to support America, we are not asking for that.  Rather, Common Sense Politics would like our main-stream media to report the positive side of the news too.  There are many great things coming out of our efforts in Iraq, but you would never know it listening to our biased press.

Mr. Obama – Loud and Clear! is a post from: Common Sense University

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Standing up for the good of America.  Finally, a decision-making, selfless politician that has accomplished worthwhile projects that help America.  Let her loose in Washington D.C. with your vote in November.  Mrs. Palin will bring Common Sense Politics back to America’s Capitol.

A Breath of Fresh Air – Sarah Palin is a post from: Common Sense University

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Barack Hussein Obama II was born on August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, his father was a foreign student from Kenya and his mother was Ann Dunham from Kansas, they met as students at the University of Hawaii but divorced after a few years of marriage. After her divorce, Ann Dunham met and married Lolo Soetoro from Indonesia and in 1967, when Barack was only six years old, they moved to Indonesia where Obama attended local schools in Jakarta until he was ten years old. In 1971, he was sent back to Honolulu where he lived with his maternal grandparents until his high school graduation in 1979. The only reason we write this is to better understand his rather eventful early years and youth, moving and living in Indonesia and then returning to Hawaii.

After two years at Occidental College in Los Angeles, he transferred to Columbia University in New York where in 1983 he earned his B.A. in political science. In 1985, Obama moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer for three years as director of the Developing Communities Project, a church-based community organization. In 1988, he entered Harvard Law School where he graduated with a J.D. magna cum laude in 1991 and returned to Chicago, working for several law firms and writing/publishing a book “Dreams from my Father”. He entered politics in the mid 90′s and was elected to the Illinois State Senate in 1997 until he ran in 2004 for the United States Senate and won by a large margin. He has been a U.S. Senator since January 4, 2005.

In the late 80′s, he joined the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago and was a member until his recent disassociation for political expediency. Obama claims, that the Reverend Jeremiah Wright while introducing him to loving Jesus Christ, became his spiritual advisor, mentor and longtime friend over a period of nearly twenty years. Barack Obama met his wife Michelle in Chicago and they got married in 1992 at this church and they also had their two daughters baptized by Rev. Wright. A perfectly normal religious background until earlier this year when some of the more hate filled and outrageous sermons by Rev. Wright were shown on television and the public was stunned, to say the least, see our article on March 21 entitled “The Hate Rants of Obama’s Pastor“. Mr. Obama has tried to tell everybody that he was never present when the Reverend made those statements. Eventually after the Rev. Wright went public with more televised speeches, Obama disavowed his association with him and also left the Trinity United Church of Christ.

We find it truly mindboggling and unbelievable that a man running for the office of President will act more like a slick used car salesman than someone that is hoping to lead a county.  Sorry if this offends any used car salespeople, but you know what we mean.  We even hope that integrity and honesty is now pursued for these auto sales positions, but we certainly expect America’s leaders to possess undeniable and unquestionable integrity and honesty.  The world is filled with people whose emotions guide their belief system.  We are just asking that emotions be replaced with accuracy and integrity when leading America. Let’s be real, he wants us to believe that in many hundreds of sermons over twenty years time, the good pastor never said anything outrageous that would have offended him, Barack Obama. For clarification, this church is based on so called Black Liberation Theology, a form of liberation theology not well known throughout America that is centered on past oppression of blacks by whites. You can read their mission statement and more details by using search engines.

Why is that really important? Barack Obama is a brilliant orator, he can hold his audiences during his speeches in awe, his followers are madly in love with him and are totally committed to getting him elected President of the United States of America.

The reason this is very important is the fact that very little is known about the Senator, Unlike John McCain who has been known to Americans for more than 35 years when he was released from Vietnam prisons, Barack Obama has just recently arrived on the national scene. In fact, he was not even well known before he declared his intentions to seek the Presidency in February of last year. And while he was not at first considered a serious candidate among the nearly dozen Democrats, he is now the presumptuous nominee of the Democrat Party. Should he win in November, he will be our President for at least four years and we believe a much closer look at him, his programs and his proposals is warranted.

Barack Obama’s campaign theme is “Change we can believe in”. At first site, a really very ‘catchy’ sound bite, no doubt about it. As we have experienced during the past 18 months, the Democrats in Congress ran in November 2006 on “It is time for a change” and as we have stated in recent articles, we know now what that change has brought us. Change is by definition a transformation or conversion from something currently existing. But change does not automatically mean that things will change for the better. There are right changes and there are wrong changes. As a people, there is no way that we all agree on what changes are right and which ones are wrong. So, therefore, promoting change cannot possible be considered a good thing by great numbers of people and has to be considered nothing more than a campaign slogan without any true meaning.  If change is the end goal, then Barack might be the man for the job, as he not only speaks about such change but also changes his beliefs regularly.  Maybe a more fitting slogan would be “Beliefs are what I will change.”  These will be spelled out in future articles.

Barack Obama has said that he was against the war in Iraq before it started and he claims that as his major foreign policy credential. He took this position when he was a Senator in Illinois and nobody knew him or heard from him. As things turn around for the better now in Iraq, he has lately been somewhat more silent about bringing the troops home as soon as he is President. On domestic policy, Obama is promoting major themes from the Democrat Party playbook of class warfare: Taxing the rich and giving breaks to the poor! When it comes to energy and high gasoline prices at the pump, he does not want to drill more domestically or build more nuclear power plants or pursue other energy producing schemes (other than windmills and solar power) but wants to convert America into a “green” country and have everybody use less energy.

If it were not so important and serious right now, this would be wonderful material for Saturday Night Life and other comedy shows and movies. We have to seriously question the naivety of Senator Obama. How is the trucking industry, our major transporter of goods and supplies in America going to change to solar and wind power or use less gasoline in their jobs?

 There are two points to be made: First, if they do not have adequate gasoline supplies for transporting the goods, we will face food shortages in a short time as we have not seen them since the Great Depression. Second, with prices for gas and diesel skyrocketing, everything will become more expensive. Does Senator Obama understand this? We do not think so!

We here at this Common Sense Politics strongly believe that Barack Obama is nothing more than a very liberal politician who is riding a tsunami of popularity only because he is an incredibly great speaker/orator, supported by a biased media who cheers him on. You put him on stage in front of a crowd with a teleprompter and he will deliver a wonderful speech with which he wows the audience. But so were many others in the past. No comparison intended but Adolf Hitler and his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels were great speakers as well and they could enthuse 70 or more million Germans about 63 to 78 years ago, ask any German over 85 years of age, they will confirm it.

Barack Obama’s proposals for America are ideologically liberal: Its class warfare when he wants to tax the “Rich”, punish people and companies who make a lot of money, he proposes universal health care in America and other changes with empty rhetoric, no specifics. He is for change and promises hope, he has said that he wants to meet unconditionally with dictators around the world (Iran, North Korea, Venezuela etc) and he blames the Bush administration for everything he disagrees with. And he is now attempting to link his opponent John McCain as a candidate who represents the ‘third term’ of the George W. Bush presidency. To us here at Common Sense Politics, he requires a lot more scrutiny before November 4, his proposals need to be looked at much more analytical, his constant flip-flopping on positions such as the recent change in campaign financing (going now for private funding of his campaign in stead of public funding) is the trait of a typical opportunistic candidate who makes decisions on political expediency and then explaining it away by blaming others for those flip-flops. What kind of President will he be? We will find out should he be elected.  What price will we have to pay for his Presidency?  We guess, the price paid will cost America trillions of dollars and many individual rights and freedoms!  Stay Tuned.

Candidate’s Assessment: Barack Obama is a post from: Common Sense University

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John Sidney McCain III was born into a family of longtime military officers (his father and his grandfather were Admirals in the U.S. Navy) and he has been a United States Senator since 1987 and was most recently (in November 2004) re-elected for a fourth term by the voters in Arizona. He will be 72 years old in late August, is married to his wife Cindy since 1980 and they have four children together, ages 24 to 17, the youngest one adopted in 1991 from an orphanage of Mother Teresa. McCain is well known and considered a war hero for having been a POW in Vietnam for 5.5 years from 1967 until his release in 1972.

Now then, his political career has been seen as that of a maverick. He has maintained a certain amount of independence and has voted against party line many times including voting in opposition of the 2001 and 2003 Bush tax cuts. Some of his positions have been even considered outright liberal by conservatives when he crossed party lines and voted with the Democrats on issues such as campaign finance reform and last year on immigration reform in a bill co-sponsored by Senator Ted Kennedy. The effort to pass this legislation failed when Congress heard from the American people in vast numbers who were opposed to the law. He now claims that he heard the people and agrees that we should secure the border (to Mexico) first before any kind of immigration reform law should be considered.

But he achieved receiving the nomination for President of the Republican Party over a number of competitors, as we all know. He considers himself the Chairman of the so called ‘Straight Talk Express’ meaning that you will get his unvarnished opinion every time he speaks. His strength during the primary campaign was the fact that he had been right about how the Iraq War was managed wrongly (by then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld) for some time and proven correct when he strongly supported a surge in troops that has now turned out to have been successful. McCain’s strengths are in the areas of security, foreign policy and war execution while his knowledge of economics and energy issues including his support for Global Change policies seem to be less strong. He finds himself in a peculiar position since the conservative base of the Republican Party is not sold on him, in fact, has been and still is very critical of him. It will remain to be seen how many of them will sit out this election come November. McCain is counting on the support from the moderate and independent voters and even cross-over Democrats. There is not a single speech by John McCain in which he does not say “My friends, I know what is right for America and I will get things done. I have worked successfully in Congress with members of the Democrat Party and therefore know what it takes to do just that and get results!” These are very strong words and we do not think that they provide a sense of comfort for many Republicans, especially conservatives. They know what he has done in the past when he crossed party lines to get things done. They are afraid that he will do this again should he become President next January. His independent positions have several times gotten results diametrically opposed by conservatives and we believe that is the main reason why his support among Republican Party faithful is not solid, or as solid as it could be.

He has not yet chosen a running mate and he has ample time to do that in the weeks to come, he has over two months in fact to do so. This has of course not kept the pundits and the media from daily speculation as to whom he, John McCain, might pick. We will not enter such speculations but we think that his selection criteria have to include the VP candidate’s readiness to step in should something happen to McCain as well as some proven executive experience. Heaven forbid, he picks another United States Senator like Joe Lieberman or Lindsey Graham. They are his close and trusted friends and have been at his side on many issues for several years. And while trust should be a factor in his selection process, it should not be an overriding one. We have witnessed John McCain to be very sensitive towards criticism, his responses have many times been very caustic, resulting in his reputation as having a temper and ‘easily flying off the handle’. A great number of citizens consider this and his age strong reasons not to vote for him.

Let us look at what he has promised should he become President:

• A strong defense of the country and no early withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan;
• Determined to continue the War on Terror;
• Extending the Bush tax cuts which are expiring in 2010;
• Nominating constructionist judges to the Federal benches and especially the United States Supreme Court like John Roberts and Antonin Scalia;
• He is FOR oil drilling on the Outer Continental shelves but AGAINST drilling in ANWR (Alaska);
• He proposes to built nearly fifty additional nuclear power plants across America;
• He supports efforts to fight Global Warming (Climate Change) and strong pursuit of developing alternative energies.

These are the main issues in his campaign, a truly mixed bag of conservative and moderate ideas. It might serve him well come election time in that he has something for a lot of people. It cannot be considered a staunch conservative agenda but there is enough moderation that people can vote for him. This is where the element of trust comes in: Will the conservatives in America trust him to remain faithful to their basic beliefs or will they vote for him as the lesser of two evils before sitting out the election altogether? There are still 135 days until November 5 and a lot of things can happen. There will be the selection of his Vice Presidential running mate, there will be the Republican convention in early September, there should be at least three Presidential debates with Senator Obama and the economy and the War in Iraq can still change drastically and they could be strong factors influencing and even determining the outcome of this year’s election.

One thing that can be said though about John McCain, should he become President, there will be very few surprises as to his actions since he has a long and proven track record from his more than twenty years in the United States Senate. It will be up to the voters in November what they think to be most important issues for them and their families and friends in terms of security, safety and economy.

Candidate’s Assessment: John McCain is a post from: Common Sense University

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