2008 Election

I have purposely tried to not make this blog controversial, because I know people from all kinds of political, religious, income, and ethnic groups, and I just want to have a blog for people to keep track of me. I started a Facebook page, but I know a lot of people who aren't on Facebook. However, I have decided to declare what I am doing this election year and why and get it over with!

I am voting for Obama and Biden. I'm not particularly excited about them. I voted for Hillary Clinton in the primary and wasn't that excited about her either. I voted for her because she is around the same age group as me and has had many of the same issues and experiences. It was great that a woman was running. Also, things did not go so badly during the Bill Clinton presidency. There weren't a lot of wars and employment was pretty good, and he did balance the budget! I also didn't know that much about Obama.

Obama seems more in touch with the problems in this country since he has been a community activist. Biden has been around a long time and I think also is somewhat in touch with the problems in this country. The more conservative side of me feels better about an older fellow who's been around a long time, although he kind of bores me. Michele Obama, similar to Sarah Palin and Hillary, seems like a superwoman. I could never be a superwoman, so I definitely admire anyone who can be one. If I tried to be a superwoman, you would soon be visiting me at a place called Bekavac (which is the nearest funeral home!). Even though I live a healthy lifestyle and can run fairly long distances, I'm a pretty tired person.

I feel more strongly against McCain/Palin. So in a sense, I'm voting more against them than for someone. McCain first really turned me off when he came to Pittsburgh with Bush. For a fundraiser for him, people could pay $10,000 to have their picture taken with Bush. I think about 75 people in this area forked over the $10,000. I felt VERY STRONGLY I did not want to vote for the same person as people who have $10,000 to have their picture taken with Bush! It wasn't just because it was Bush. If the people had forked over $10,000 to have their picture taken with Sidney Crosby or Ben Roethlisberger, I would have been turned off.

I don't think I would have liked anyone McCain picked as a running mate. However, I really do not like Sarah Palin. I admire her achievements, but I don't like her as a vice president. I understand why McCain had to pick her. He had to do something about the Republican Party which seemed more and more to just be about rich people identified with oil companies, particularly white men. He had to do something to shake it up. It's admirable he picked someone different and a woman. However, I just don't think she would be a good vice president. First of all, she is a governor, not a senator or rep, from Alaska, and I don't think she's been many other places besides Alaska and Idaho. So I don't think she understands much about what is really going on in this country. Also, she has too many children and her stand on abortion is too conservative. Alaska and Idaho are states with wide open spaces that can support more children. However, that is not true for most of the US. This is the wrong message to send to women about having large families. There are too many people. People need to limit their family size because there aren't enough jobs and this is bad for global warming. In addition, she is still having children. What will happen if an old guy like McCain gets sick or dies in office and an inexperienced pregnant vice president takes over! I think Alaska is a very different, frontier type of state and they can support someone like Ms. Palin, but I don't think she is ready to be the most powerful leader in the world. Also, I'm really turned off by the pictures of her kneeling over a dead caribou she's just shot. This woman is just too much into guns. Guns are a huge problem in most of this country. Again, this lifestyle is probably normal in Alaska, but it sends the wrong message to the rest of the country.

One of my favorite shows is "Ice Road Truckers" and I also watch things like "Tougher in Alaska". I watch everything on TV about Alaska, northern Canada, Siberia, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Greenland, etc., so I'm not totally ignorant about this culture. I don't know if someone who has not been OUT of this culture ever, however, is ready to lead the entire US.

As for McCain, I just think he is too much for rich people. Although he's been in Washington quite awhile, I don't know if he is in touch with the problems of real Americans to the extent Obama and Biden are. Getting back to the issue of too many children, McCain will be more likely to continue to ship off all our jobs to India, another country that encourages people to have too many children, and then many people live in misery. I like India because I like a lot of things about the Hindu religion, but they need to do something about their birth rate, and our country is going to end up in poverty and depression if all our jobs are shipped off to India. There are lots of negative things about China, but I feel better about buying things from them since they do attempt to limit their birth rate.

I'm really not sure whether things will improve with Obama and Biden but I'm afraid McCain and Palin will lead us into disaster!