Why I Support Obama, and Why You Need To Vote This Tuesday

PART 1: WHY YOU SHOULD VOTE.

- So I've wanted to talk about the Presidential Election for a while now, but now I think I've reached the breaking point where it's time to speak out. So much has been going on the last few days in the world of politics, it's certainly easy to get bogged down in all of the talking heads and endless punditry on cable news shows and the like. I know for many, all of the noise is overwhelming. But this is a critical election, and a crucial primary season. In only a few days, on Super Tuesday, the country will take a huge step towards deciding who will be the next president. The sad thing is - these vital decisions will be made by a select few and not necessarily represent a true populist vote. So I truly hope though that the turnout for the big primaries is high, and most of all that young people aged 18-30 actually go out and vote. I'm 25, this will be my third time voting in a presidential election, and the one thing that's been consistent is that, every four years, I've been alternatively hopeful and then disappointed in my fellow Gen Y'ers for failing to come out to vote. It's part of the reason why Bush was elected to two consecutive turns by a narrow margin - the young people who should have been out there supporting Gore and Kerry didn't show up to the dance.

So on this coming Super Tuesday, and eventually, in the coming general election, I can't emphasize enough how important it is vote. If you don't, and you don't like the outcome of the elections, then you deserve to place a large part of the blame on yourself. We are reaching real turning points on a number of key issues - issues that I think most Americans would like to reach common ground on, but issues that have been made into unnecessarily contentious hot buttons by the Bush administration. It's now or never on Global Warming. Now or never on reestablishing America's reputation in the world. Now or never on choosing science over politically-motivated untruths. Now or never on stabilizing the economy. If America chooses the wrong candidate, we could tumble over the edge of the cliff when it comes to turning the corner on many of these areas in which we've horribly veered off course.

But in this election, I am once again hopeful. Hopeful because for the first time since Bill Clinton, there's a Democratic candidate who truly has the ability to inspire young and old alike. That person is Barack Obama, a candidate who I've been a fan of for a long while now and a man who will be getting my vote come Tuesday in the California primary.

Now, Obama has become a kind of defacto candidate of choice for many people under 30. He has the cool factor, no doubt, and his relative youth and energy and freshness has undoubtedly been a welcome change from the usual Washington establishment. But I think there are also real, tangible reasons why he is the best candidate for president. However, before I specifically focus on Obama, I'd like to talk in a bit more general terms ...

PART 2: WHY YOU SHOULD VOTE FOR A DEMOCRAT

- A few weeks ago, this would have been an easy one to write. To me, most of the Republican candidates are a scary mix of right-wing extremism and one-note jingoism. Right now, I'm happy to see Guliani out of the race. Here was a guy whose sole claim to fame was being the mayor of New York City during September 11th, 2001. Not only did he botch many aspects of the aftermath of that tragedy, but he's used 9/11 as his entire platform for running for president. He's been stuck in the September 12th mindset for the last six years, and he's a broken record. He claimed that he would be a tough foreign policy guy, but he has zero foreign policy experience, and his continued simplistic view of "us vs. them" ignores the current, complicated realities of Iraq and the broader middle east. As far as presidential candidates go, good riddance to Rudy.

As far as Huckabee, well, he's much more likable than Rudy, but in a way that makes him all the more scary. This is a guy who believes that every word of the bible is literally true, who wants to break down the barriers of church and state and who would help create the most lax gun-control laws this country has seen in decades at a time when just the oppossite is needed. Make no mistake, Huckabee is an ultra-conservative and a very dangerous potential President. I admire the fact that he can crack a joke at his own expense, and I can't help but admit he always comes off as amiable. But a Chuck Norris endorsement a good Presidential candidate does not make.

Now, Romney is a guy who's a total wild card, and that is also a scary proposition. As a former governor, he has no foreign policy experience, but he's trying to paint himself as a big-business guy who will turn Washington around as if he's buying out a new company. Well, while efficiency in the White House would be a welcome change, Romney comes off as a blank slate who will change positions on a whim to earn votes. As governor of Massachussets, he painted himself as a moderate Republican who was more liberal on social issues, and who never really made his religious views a factor in his politics. Now, we see Romney pandering to the Republican's evangelical base, and looking like a man with a completely different political philosophy than the guy who governed Mass. A guy who panders to special interests and pledges to run the US government like a business? Where have I seen that before?

Okay, so McCain is now looking like the clear GOP frontrunner, and for many moderates he seems like an attractive option. The guy has credibility when it comes to foreign policy. He's a tenured and well-respected senator, and one who's shown a willingness to compromise on issues and work in a bipartisan manner. But McCain is currently benefitting from a bit of good luck in Iraq. He was for the Surge, and the temporary respite in bloodshed makes it appear that said Surge is working. Big deal. Iraq is now a long-term problem - no big surprise, as the entire war was the product of stupidity and misrepresented political agendas. McCain was on the wrong side of that one, and I hate that just because he's a military guy he will always take the position that military action is such a great and justified course of action. Furthermore, let's not beat around the bush here, McCain is no spring chicken. He's over 70 and has admitted that he's out of touch when it comes to little things like science and technology. If we are to reverse the problems of climate change, get off of foreign oil, and right the economy, how can we elect a President who doesn't have the knowledge to make intelligent decisions about cutting-edge issues? McCain is an old-school guy who's not shown a full understanding of some of the issues that plague us in the here and now, and his approach to foreign policy has been forever rooted in the worldview of the 50's and 60's. To me that makes him the wrong man for the job.

Now, on a larger scale, let's look at the fundamental problems associated with the Republican party. Even for McCain who claims to be a moderate, he's still a Republican so most of the same rules apply:

- Lack of focus on the problem of Climate Change - perhaps THE most pressing issue of the next 20 years, and one that needs to be addressed ASAP. Republicans like Romney still won't even fully ACKNOWLEDGE that global warming is a legitimate problem. How mixed-up is THAT? It's part of a continuing Republican trend of simply choosing to ignore hard science when it's convenient for their agenda.

- A view of the Iraq war that is fundamentally wrong, in that it supports Bush's flimsy justification for war, which is that Saddam Hussein's regime was directly tied to Al Queda and the events of 9/11. Not to mention, a misguided view that this is a war that must be "won" in a conventional sense, and in a necessarilly drawn-out, protracted fashion. McCain is just downright disturbing to listen to in terms of his view on this war - he still sees it as another World War II, another Vietnam, when it's anything but. Even worse, in an effort to defend the war, the Republicans too often ignore the real problems that have yet to see closure following 9/11 - the fact that Bin Laden and other terrorists are still out there, the fact that countries like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and pockets of Europe are now breeding grounds for terrorists, the growing problem of Iran, and the fact that in all the focus on Iraq, we've lost sight of the of the real enemy.

- A direct association with an ultra-right wing, Christian Fundamentalist base. This means that with a Republican in office, we are in real danger of less and less separation between Church and State, which is one of the most important principles that America was founded on. Pressure to appease the religious right means everything from denying evolution, to overturning Roe vs. Wade, to banning stem cell research. Why would we want to go backward as a country, getting back into debates that most had thought settled, literally, a hundred years ago. Do we really want the national embarrasment of going through another Scopes Monkey Trial 100 years after the fact?

- Economic priorities that are way off-kilter. Bush's tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans were a joke, and we're now seeing just how much of a misjudgement they were. Now yes, McCain was against these tax cuts, but the fact remains: the Republican party has historically been in bed with big industry, with the oil companies, with the ultra-upper-classes, and so on. It's time for economic policy that rewards innovation, environmental compliance, the middle class, and small business. Policy that helps lift up those who are struggling, allows people to have a second chance, and guarantees health insurance to all Americans. Even a relative moderate like McCain clings to claims that he is a true-blue conservative, and a large part of that is the fact that, when push comes to shove, he is.

- Hypocracy. This doesn't necessarily apply directly to the presidential candidates, but it's something that bothers me to no end about the Republican party. So much of the Republican message is about creating fear in Americans. Fear of terrorists, fear of immigrants, fear of homosexuals, fear of the media's influence. And yet, fifteen national Republican officials have been convicted of crimes in the past year alone. More than a few have been caught for sexual misconduct. It goes to show how so much of the GOP agenda is about blindly playing off of the most base fears of uneducated Americans, and how so often, when the microscope is turned inward, the true hypocracy of their rhetoric is exposed.

PART 3: WHY YOU SHOULD VOTE FOR OBAMA OVER CLINTON

- Okay, I think that outlined why it's time for a Democrat to once again be in the White House. But now the question is - Why Obama? To many Democrats, Bill Clinton was an iconic figure who did a great deal of good for our country, so it's easy to side with Hillary in an effort to try to recapture the feeling of hope and prosperity that we enjoyed under Bill. But for a number of reasons, the Clintons' time has passed and it's time for new blood in Washington. And the remarkable thing is - Obama is very much like a young Bill Clinton - except that, with a few solid and productive terms as a Senator under his belt, Obama is already in some ways MORE prepared for the White House than Bill was in 1992. Bill talks about Obama's myth as being a mere "fairy tale." Well, how else to describe Bill's own '92 rise to prominence, which was as much about saxaphone playing on Arsenio, appearances on MTV's Rock The Vote, and clever, forward-looking slogans as it was actual political experience.

The fact is, Obama has that Clinton-ian ability to inspire hope. He is a powerful speaker and a superb orator - qualities that shouldn't be underestimated as being important in a President, as a large part of the job is being able to inspire and rally the public. In addition, Obama has, at this point, addressed each major issue of the campaign in a clear, articulate, and intelligent manner. On the issues that count, Obama in my mind is more often than not on the right side of the coin. He has been a longtime opponent of the war in Iraq, but unlike Hillary and Edwards, has shown poise and restraint in terms of how he would manage the situation and try to achieve greater stability in the middle east. The fact is that we are in the war, and any plans to pull out of Iraq can't be done merely as a means of sticking it to Bush. Obama has expressed a realization of this fact and hasn't jumped to set hasty timetables or pull out all personnel immediately. Likewise, he's expressed a commitment to go after the true terrorists and refocus our foreign policy to better target other problem areas of the world that have long been ignored. Darfur, anyone? Barack has spoken about the urgent need to change our environmental policies and has shown an understanding of both the idealsitic and practical sides of the issue. He's had smart and commendable thigns to say about Israel and the broader middle-east. His record as a public servant and private citizen shows a dedication to helping lower-income families rise up from urban decay. Perhaps most impressive is Barack's lack of interaction with special interest groups and lobbyists. This is a guy who doesn't seem willing to bend to the will of powerful special interests and has shown no qualms about taking on anyone, from the big oil companies to the NRA to the religious right. To me that is exactly what is needed right now - a leader who shoots straight, tackles problems in a way that leaves nothing hidden, and is more about serving than people than the special interests.

Hillary Clinton, if you look up and down her policy positions, is indeed similar in many respects to Obama. But Clinton has proven a divisive figure, whereas Obama has proved to be a uniter of sorts. Hillary's experience in the national spotlight has been long and intense, but her experience as an actual elected official is brief. I don't think it's fair to give her credit for the many accomplishments of the Bill Clinton administration - when Hillary talks about her experience, I think it's actually a very vague thing. We know she was hands-on as the First Lady, but that was not an elected position and not one that she earned on her own merits. Meanwhile, for reasons both political and personal, Hillary has garnered the spite of many Republicans, and many Americans in general. I think that a lot of that is unwarranted and often downright wrong, but the fact remains - a Hillary Clinton presidency is anything but a fresh start, and is guaranteed to bring with it the continuation of old feuds and tensions left over from the 90's.

Obama, on the other hand, truly is a breath of fresh air. To me, his newness on the scene is an asset - we've been so bogged down in partisan politics that we need someone who comes in as a relative blank slate - someone who can get things done by virtue of his lack of indoctrination into the politics-as-usual system of Washington.

And as I said, Obama has come out on the right side of important issues. The environment, the war in Iraq, social rights, the economy. He comes across as a man with a vision and drive to correct our course, and to do great things for our country. To me Hillary would be politics as usual, and that is NOT what we need at this crucial juncture. We need someone who thinks outside the box, but attacks issues with reason and intelligence. Someone who listens to varied opinions yet doesn't flip-flop on important issues whenever it's politically convenient. Someone who can bring a new energy to Washington and revitalize the body politic. And, I think, Obama is that someone. The fact is - Hillary is not an inspiring candidate - she's someone who's scratched and clawed her way to the top of the political universe and who comes across as someone who relishes that power that comes with the political game. When watching Hillary, and even Bill, speak of late, I can't help but view them as people whose time in the spotlight has passed. They had their moment, and despite all of their accomplishments, the odd story of their personal lives can't help but leave a bad taste, and the relative staleness of their politics can't hope to inspire.

In the end, Obama is the person who I believe will be the best possible leader for our country, going forward - the man to lead us into a NEW era, one that people of my generation as well as others can find reason to get excited about. From his smart and well-articulated positions to his commitment to the issues that affect the future of this country, Obama represents the best of the Democratic ideals and stands as clear evidence of why the Democratic party is such an important alternative to our current administration. He alone combines a fresh, hopeful perspective with a promise for change and an understanding of the real problems facing America today. He has my vote, and hopefully yours as well.