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Oct 26, 2004
4 more years
When I was a young boy, back during the Regan era, I was a hardcore republican. Of course, I had no idea what that meant, but Regan was a Republican, so I was a Republican. All of this despite the fact that I came from a city dominated by democrats in a state dominated by democrats and a family full of democrats. But, I was 10 years old, so it really didn't matter. As I got older and started to form my political ideologies, I found myself leaning to the left a little bit. When it came time to fill out that voter registration card, I found myself torn between Democrat and Independant. Since many state and local races were decided in the Democratic primary, I went with the Democrats. But, I found myself not that excited about either party. As I got to college, my good friend Fred Smith spent a great deal of time trying to convince me that a Christian should be a conservative. I never quite agreed with his assessment, but I did find that I had been previously given a skewed version of what conservatism was all about. So, I found myself shifting toward the right a bit. With all of that said, I a. Am not really impressed with either party. b. Have no real loyatlies to either. I call myself a moderate. That's probablly not exactly accurate. I am quite liberal on some issues. I am quite conservative on some issues. On others, I may be conservative but allow for certain situations. But, for the most part, the older I get, the more I feel that the government is not the solution for a lot of situations. I have some firsthand knowledge of that. I got to expirence beuracracy first-hand durning my first summer job, working for the Commonwealth of Kentucky Labor Cabinet. I have also worked for Social Services, and now I work for KY Medicaid. My point in saying all of this is that, when it comes to politics, I'm not an issue guy. The issues definately factor in. But, for me, the deciding factor is leadership. I can disagree with him or her on some issues, even key issues. But if the guy is not an effective leader, forget it. During the Clinton years, that's what frustrated me the most. The guy would not take strong stands, fearing how it would play out in the polls. I understand that in a representative republic, listening to the constituancy is important, but at times you have to stand up and do what is right. Clinton didn't do that. But he was charasmatic enough to pull off leading like that, plus the happened to be in office during good economic times (and he was partially responsible for that, but the same policies help create the following recession, but that's a whole other post.) And Gore was even worse. He constantly kept trying to re-define himself, to the point that by the election in 2000, he was just a shell of himself. At the time, I wasn't overly impressed with Bush. I thought he could be a good President. But, I also thought that the time wasn't right for him. But, put him up against Gore, and the choice was obvious to me. After he took office, Bush suprised me. I found him to be very effective as a President. And then something big happened. And the world changed. Now, Bush may or may not have made some mistakes. But you have to consider this when you judge him. He is responsible for the safety of everyone in this contry. That's about 1/4 billion people. We can sit back, talk about it, speculate. He has to act. When I look at it from that perspective, I think he has acted brilliantly. More on Bush in a second. I began following this particular election back in January, starting with the first Democratic primary debate. At the time, it looked like I might be voting in the Democratic primary, but usually these things are decided long before the KY primaries in May. As I watched the debates, I wasn't impressed with any of these guys. Howard Dean could be charasmatic, but was way to far to the left (okay, so maybe I do vote the issues). Edwards kept making the same speech over and over and over and over and over and over. I can almost quote the whole 2 Americas speech by rote. However, I'm not one to vote for people who try to stir up class warfare (it would take a lot more time to fully explain what I mean by that statement.) Sharpton and Kuccinich, and Mobley Braun were never really serious canidates. Clark, well, I have some theories as to why he was even running in the first place, but I won't go into that here. I've never been impressed with Gephardt's leadership in the House. That left Leiberman and Kerry. Leiberman I do have a lot of respect for. Had he been at the top of the ticket in 2000, I may have voted for him (I don't really know). Kerry, on the other hand, I didn't know much about. And there wasn't really all of that much compelling me either way on him. And, I think that's exactly how he got the nomination. The hard left in this election hates Bush. There's not secret about that. Right now, they don't care about their agenda. I don't think they even care if the candiate really agrees with them on one single issue. You kept hearing it in the exit polls back in the spring . . . the number one issue was electability. And that's where Kerry came in. After the Dean meltdown (which was highly overrated, I might add), it basically came down to Kerry and Edwards as the safe canidates. They thought that their hatred for Bush was a lot more universal (which it wasn't . . . they misread uncertainty as dislike), and so they figured if the put someone in who wasn't all that controversial, they could win. Edwards was young and inexperience, so they went with Kerry. As I watched Kerry going into the summer, his rhetoric annoyed me. At this point, I can't tell you why anymore. I just remember it did. Meanwhile, back to Bush. Back at the beginning of the year, I felt Bush had done a pretty good job. Not perfect, but pretty well. But, he didn't have my vote locked up. If someone better came along, I would vote for them. But, I got the feeling that Kerry was not that guy. Mainly, I didn't see any real plan that he had, just a series of criticisms against Bush. So, I watched most of the Democratic convetions, and was less than impressed. Two reasons went into this, 1. I thought they took some mean-spirited jabs against conservatism, insinuating that you were some heartless moron if you took conservative stands on issues, and 2. I expected to hear Kerry's plan. All I got was the same rhetoric I had been hearing for 8 months. The Republican convention was much better, and granted there was some rhetoric I didn't like, but for the most part they made their case better. I think the polls following those events indicated that. That, and the swift boat thing, which was overblown. Finally, during the debates, I started liking Kerry a little bit better. He finally broke from the old rhetoric and gave us some new material. As far as the scorecard goes, I think that Kerry won the first one, and the other 2 were likely draws. But it wasn't until the third debate that I felt Kerry actually laid out his plan. While I was glad to finally hear his plan, I wasn't that impressed with it. On many issues, I kept thinking "that's not going to work." Anyway, my point is, I have warmed up to Kerry a lot. I kinda like the guy even. But, I think Bush is a better president. I think a lot of Bush's poll struggles come from the Florida incident. Also you have people on the hard left that won't vote Republican no matter what. But, I think there is a third thing at work. The fact is, the world is messed up right now. We have economic issues, security issues, and a whole bunch of other messes. People aren't sure about the world right now. And, fair or unfair, Bush gets the blame for that. I think that's the reason for the amount of undecided voters at present. I bring all of that up to say that I think Bush has done a good job. No, he hasn't solved all of our problems, and no not everything he has touched has turned to gold. But, I think given the circumstances, he has done as much as you could ask of someone in 4 years. You may disagree, and that's fine. That's just my stance on it. I don't like war. I don't like the fact that we are at war. I understand the serious implications of a war. I'm not sure that, given my beliefs, that I could fight in a war. But, I do support this war. And I understand that my stance is potentially hippocritical, and I accept any criticism that comes from that. However, I do not believe that peace and pacifism are always the same thing. And, from reading the entire Bible over the last year, one alarming theme that comes up over and over is taking up for the poor, weak, and helpless. Another is standing up for justice. And, I believe that the goverments job is to protect it's people. I hate that people have to get killed for that to happen. It makes me sick to my stomach and I almost want to cry when I think about it. But, I also understand some of the greater implications at stake, and it makes me even sicker when I think about how Afghan and Iraqi governments have treated their people. All of you opposed to the war, I ask you this: Where is the outrage over the mass grave sites found in Iraq? I get so angry every time I think about it. As for Bush's domestic policy, I think it's very underrated. Bush has accomplished quite a bit. I really beleive the tax cuts will help the economy in the long run. Conversly, I don't see how raising taxes on the people who do the hiring is going to create any jobs. No child left behind is an excellent program on education, as indicated by rising test scores. Education vouchers are providing low income students with amazing education oppertunities. I think he would have accomplished a lot more, but 9-11 created a lot of issues that had to be addressed immediately. Given another 4 years, I think Bush's domestic agenda will be even stronger. The major difference between Bush and Kerry is that Bush has a vision that sees the government as not the solution to a lot of the problems. Take health care for example. Kerry's plan is to take children off of Medicaid and put all children at 300 percent of the poverty level on CHIP (a program many states have to cover children.) Then, he intends to expand Medicaid to include all adults at 200 percent of the poverty rate. Do you realize how much this is going to cost. And that's not just the money that actually goes to pay the medical bills. See, I work for Medicaid. I understand how the system works. I'm glad it's in place for the people who need it. But, it's incredibly inefficent. The beuracracy that's involved is incredible. To increase the coverage, you have to push even more money into it. There must be a better way. Plus, the rest of Kerry's health plan is a lot like the one Gov Brearton Jones implemented in Kentucky in the early 90's. Guess what happened. 43 of the 45 insurance companies left the state. Why? As terrible as some people may think it is, insurance companies are buisnesses, and they are trying to make money. If we create a system that screws them over, they aren't going to stay in business. So, that's in a nutshell why I am voting for Bush. I understand that I have left certain details and issues out. And feel free to disagree. Just be respectful when you do, and I'll do the same for you. posted
by Unknown @ 1:31:00 PM |
