President_________________Who?

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Permalink Reply by belinda on June 6, 2008 at 11:36am

This is why I may end up voting McCain.....it's long but worth reading
An article from RealClearPolitics....an independent website

June 05, 2008
Obama and McCain and Iran
By Thomas Sowell

Now that the two parties have finally selected their presidential candidates, it is time for a sober-- if not grim-- assessment of where we are.
Not since 1972 have we been presented with two such painfully inadequate candidates. When election day came that year, I could not bring myself to vote for either George McGovern or Richard Nixon. I stayed home.
This year, none of us has that luxury. While all sorts of gushing is going on in the media, and posturing is going on in politics, the biggest national sponsor of terrorism in the world-- Iran-- is moving step by step toward building a nuclear bomb.

The point when they get that bomb will be the point of no return. Iran's nuclear bomb will be the terrorists' nuclear bomb-- and they can make 9/11 look like child's play.
All the options that are on the table right now will be swept off the table forever. Our choices will be to give in to whatever the terrorists demand-- however outrageous those demands might be-- or to risk seeing American cities start disappearing in radioactive mushroom clouds.

All the things we are preoccupied with today, from the price of gasoline to health care to global warming, will suddenly no longer matter.
Just as the Nazis did not find it enough to simply kill people in their concentration camps, but had to humiliate and dehumanize them first, so we can expect terrorists with nuclear weapons to both humiliate us and force us to humiliate ourselves, before they finally start killing us.
They have already telegraphed their punches with their sadistic beheadings of innocent civilians, and with the popularity of videotapes of those beheadings in the Middle East.
They have already telegraphed their intention to dictate to us with such things as Osama bin Laden's threats to target those places in America that did not vote the way he prescribed in the 2004 elections. He could not back up those threats then but he may be able to in a very few years.
The terrorists have given us as clear a picture of what they are all about as Adolf Hitler and the Nazis did during the 1930s-- and our "leaders" and intelligentsia have ignored the warning signs as resolutely as the "leaders" and intelligentsia of the 1930s downplayed the dangers of Hitler.
We are much like people drifting down the Niagara River, oblivious to the waterfalls up ahead. Once we go over those falls, we cannot come back up again.
What does this have to do with today's presidential candidates? It has everything to do with them.

One of these candidates will determine what we are going to do to stop Iran from going nuclear-- or whether we are going to do anything other than talk, as Western leaders talked in the 1930s.
There is one big difference between now and the 1930s. Although the West's lack of military preparedness and its political irresolution led to three solid years of devastating losses to Nazi Germany and imperial Japan, nevertheless when all the West's industrial and military forces were finally mobilized, the democracies were able to turn the tide and win decisively.
But you cannot lose a nuclear war for three years and then come back. You cannot even sustain the will to resist for three years when you are first broken down morally by threats and then devastated by nuclear bombs.
Our one window of opportunity to prevent this will occur within the term of whoever becomes President of the United States next January.
At a time like this, we do not have the luxury of waiting for our ideal candidate or of indulging our emotions by voting for some third party candidate to show our displeasure-- at the cost of putting someone in the White House who is not up to the job.

Senator John McCain has been criticized in this column many times. But, when all is said and done, Senator McCain has not spent decades aiding and abetting people who hate America.

On the contrary, he has paid a huge price for resisting our enemies, even when they held him prisoner and tortured him. The choice between him and Barack Obama should be a no-brainer.

Copyright 2008, Creators Syndicate Inc.

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Permalink Reply by Jennifer on June 6, 2008 at 1:15pm

I guess I still ultimately believe with all of my heart that this is all fear based. Whenever people come from a place of fear, everything is reactionary. They can not see straight. The answers to this problem aren't in fear based reactions. I don't think Obama will do nothing but talk. If something needs to happen, he will do something. But our world is global now. Finding a way to not fight with our neighbors will strengthen us and is absolutely necessary. I also believe that if we had acted differently in the first place, there wouldn't be so many countries that hate us. It is time for us to change that. I don't know how that change will be made. I don't think the answer is with us yet. But if we do the same thing we have always done we will not find the answer and that will surely end in our demise.

I used to have a very apocalyptic view of this world and how we are destroying it. I spent months in fear and rage. That place gave me nothing but more fear and rage. I shifted my view to seeing all the possibilities of change and felt this enormous rush of positive energy. I know some people may see this as being in denial or something akin to that, but I can assure you, I've been on the other side. It doesn't work. From this place I am so much more capable of making change happen. I have made change happen from this place that I absolutely could not do from the place of fear. If we all did this as a collective world or country, change would happen. That's the way it works. If we all stay in the fear place, we will end up in war.

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Permalink Reply by genie on June 6, 2008 at 3:24pm

Every day I feel that I am floating down the Niagara River, heading toward those deadly falls. My big fear is about a planet that is no longer fit for human habitation, plus plenty of other lifeforms as well.

I fear a senate that thinks that the mildest of global warming measures is too expensive -- that's some really scary shortsightedness.

I fear a political party that has steadfastly insisted that there is no global warming.

On the topic of terrorism, I fear politicians who sing "bomb, bomb Iran" more than those who are willing to sit down and dialogue. Obama never said he would limit it to talk, but as a peace loving person, that seems to me to be the place to start.

All the things that Sowell said about terrorists may be true, but not all Muslims are terrorists!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And not all Muslim nations are terrorists, and even nations currently headed by terrorist regimes are not entirely populated by terrorists. We need to appeal to the mainstream Muslims so that they will become more sympathetic to us so we can work toward common goals -- something that I believe Barack Obama could do quite nicely.

In spite of being what I consider to be an intelligent person, I can not for the life of me understand what Sowell is getting at when he mentions those who have been "aiding and abetting the people who hate America." If that's supposed to be Obama, I totally don't get it.

But hey, let me fill you in on my biases. 1972 was my first prez election, and I excitedly voted for McGovern, and I would certainly do so again -- I recently saw McGovern being interviewed on TV and he's still an awesome guy. However, I like Obama a million times more!

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Permalink Reply by Jennifer on June 6, 2008 at 4:55pm

Nicely said, Genie! I try not to let my fears take over but that doesn't mean that there is no fear at all and mine are in total agreement with yours. Oh that and us becoming a police state.

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Permalink Reply by eb on June 6, 2008 at 9:37pm

I've got to say that I believe a politician is a politician is a ....you know where I'm going. I will not vote for McCain but I do not believe that any of the candidates are completely honest. What bothers me most, in this context, and the fact that I will end up voting for him, is Obama's ties to the nuclear industry. I do believe that more nuclear technology will translate into more disease.
eb

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Permalink Reply by genie on June 6, 2008 at 11:25pm

eb -- You are so right that a politician is a politician and I keep trying to remind myself of that whilst I go through this obamamania! After watching one of the early democratic debates my daughter remarked that she thought Hillary was about 80% full of it and Obama about 60%.

I might give him a better rating than that but it's still a matter of who is the best of what we have to choose from, and, in that regard, he looks pretty damned good!

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Permalink Reply by militia207 on June 6, 2008 at 9:54pm

i wanted sooooo badly for Hilary to win the nomination and be the next president. i just want to see a woman become president of the USA. If India Pakistan England and Isreal can have female leaders why can't we. i am a democrat through and through so my support goes to Obama. If he wins it will be a groundbreaking presidency but still would have loved to see a woman win it.

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Permalink Reply by Austin from Earth! on July 12, 2008 at 3:44pm

I just thought i'd mention, that if you go to moveon.org's website you can get a free Obama bumper sticker. I've wanted one, but I just could not justify paying the shipping for it from Obama's website. $8? give me a break. So I was holding out until I went to a rally or something to snag one. Then last night on Facebook I saw a little ad... and there it was.

Yes we can, y'all. :)

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Permalink Reply by Jerome on July 13, 2008 at 1:59am

I just returned from a visit to the Kennedy Library this evening. I got to hear many of the old speeches. They reminded me of Obama. He's tapping into the same vision that inspired so many of us to think beyond ourselves and to consider working for the good of the human race.
We've been suffering under a politic that has us mistrustful of each other, labeling and fighting with people we perceive to be a threat to our lifestyles - and they are our fellow citizens, our teammates. They've tried to get us to fear and hate the rest of the world only for that approach to backfire and cause us to be feared and hated. Obama is the right person at the right time. His story and his message are what we, and the world need right now. I say, inspiration over experience. ( Hillary is not going anywhere and can continue as a great senator)

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