why I’m voting for Obama, in a nutshell.

sorry for a longish post, but I have a little ranting and raving to do.

Lately, we’ve had a few heated discussions with people over why we aren’t voting for McCain.

With Christians, the topic centers on abortion– and my feeling is that after twenty-plus years of trying to make it illegal, it is fairly obvious that even if we succeed, the problem isn’t going away.  Obama (and Hillary, for that matter, and Howard Dean*!) all concede that abortion is by any definition a terrible tragedy for all involved… and they are interested in trying to rectify some of the social ills that make it so rampant.  Which is more than McCain is willing to do, or even talk about.  And more than the vast majority of the church is doing. Furthermore, I am really tired of this being the first topic Christians bring up when talking about presidential politics… Why does it have to polarize our discussion of politics so completely?  There is so much more involved in being president and running the United States than this issue.  Why aren’t Christians talking about Iraq (which, at the moment, may be costing more lives than abortions do) or the environment or the dismal state of education or the disastrous incapacity of many people to pay for healthcare?

With others, the topic centers on money, and specifically taxes.  Certain members of my family (who will go unnamed) refer to Obama as “the tax-man” and talk about how they are going to get hit financially if he gets elected.  This remark then segues into a discussion about how poor people don’t deserve the government “handouts” that their hard-earned tax dollars would then pay for.  There are a lot of problems with this line of reasoning… first of all, one of the biggest drains on the American budget at the moment is Iraq, which was something most of the same people supported.  I think it’s a bit near-sighted to think we should get to continue to enjoy the tax-cuts Bush put in place when we chose to purchase this $10-billion-a-month war in Iraq.  Second, Obama’s plan to roll back the Bush tax cuts only applies to incomes over $250,000… and the revenue generated from the roll-back would pay for his health care plan.  But my biggest issue is, don’t presume to know how or why poor people are poor and what is best for them when you are making an income ten times greater than the poverty line.  Welfare reform is a great thing, it’s true, but making blanket statements about the moral standing of people needing welfare is fairly ridiculous, particularly coming from the mouths of Christians.

I could go on (and on and on)… but I won’t.  I’m just ready for a changing of the guard.  Another sector of my family recently got to chuckling about all the young folks that are supporting Obama and how green they are, how little experience they presumably have in electing good leaders.  My retort was, well, seems like you older folks haven’t done the hottest job and now it’s our turn… and a lot of the younger evangelical crowd is feeling the same way.

Dean’s remarks on abortion, with Tim Russert; 05/22/2005

“We have been forced into the idea of “We’re going to defend abortion.”  I don’t know anybody who thinks abortion is a good thing.  I don’t know anybody in either party who is pro-abortion.”

“We’d like to make abortion rare.  You know that abortions have gone up 25 percent since George Bush was president?”

“We believe in personal freedom and personal responsibility.  And that debate is one that we didn’t win, because we kept being forced into the idea of defending the idea of abortion.”

“Now, it–I don’t think that there is an ethical doctor in America who will do a third-term abortion without there being a reason like the health and life of the mother.  I don’t think it’s ethical to do third-term abortions, unless– just to save the health and the life of the mother.  I don’t think that’s unreasonable.  Shouldn’t this be a realm where doctors and women make up their minds instead of politicians?  What do politicians know about practicing medicine?”

“I’d prefer to see medical practice boards around the country set ethical guidelines for abortion.  I don’t have a problem with that.  You know, I don’t know of people who do third-term abortions without a moral reason for doing it, which is to save the health and life of the mother.  So let them set some ethical guidelines.  But I think this debate ought to get out of the realm of having politicians standing up and grandstanding.”

MR. RUSSERT:  Both parties have tried to use it politically.

DR. DEAN:  I agree with that, and I think that’s unfortunate.  I think it is time now for pro-life Americans and pro-choice Americans or Americans who believe in individual freedom to get together, and we have common ground.  The common ground is we’d all like to reduce the number of abortions.  But put aside the rhetoric, the difficulty and let’s work to reduce the number of abortions.  That’s something we can agree on.  I don’t think we’re going to get there with abstinence-only education.  I don’t think we’re going to get there if we condemn contraceptions or condom use and all that kind of thing. But let’s see what common ground that we have.  There are a lot of very reasonable Americans who call themselves pro-life.  There are a lot of very reasonable Americans who believe in individual choice and personal responsibility.  I think we can work together.  There are not many of us who want to see the abortion rate continue to go up as it has under President Bush.