Reasons to agree
- We should invest in infrastructure projects critical to the national economy and its flow of goods and people, instead of funding home-district pork.
Transforming Debate for Meaningful Mass Participation Objective: Enable thousands, or even millions, to contribute meaningfully to debates through structured organization and comprehensive evaluation criteria.
Reasons to agree
Issues / Strengthening Latin American Allies and Confronting Tyrants
Reasons to agree
CHALLENGE : We are faced today with the horrific proposition that those who speak of genocide are developing the capability to carry it out. Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has made statements that Israel will be wiped off the map. It's time to face the reality of the Iranian threat, take Ahmadinejad at his word and act accordingly. Iran's ambition to develop nuclear weaponry cannot be clearer: they have a virtually inexhaustible supply of clean natural gas for energy, they have refused offers to supply nuclear fuel for their power. Obviously, their nuclear ambition has nothing to do with clean energy.
GOVERNOR ROMNEY: "Some people, of course, think that it's possible to live with a nuclear Iran. That thinking is based on the theory that Iran, once it's granted the privilege of becoming a member of the nuclear club, that it will be a responsible actor. Neither their words nor their actions justify that kind of thinking." (Governor Mitt Romney, Remarks At Yeshiva University, 4/26/2007)
CHALLENGE: The 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) was meant to prevent countries from acquiring dangerous nuclear technologies and fissile materials such as plutonium and highly enriched uranium (HEU).
However, effective enforcement of this obligation is often lacking. Consequently, countries can ignore their obligations under the NPT with little fear of sanction or penalty. Given the unstable political and economic situation in many of these counties, there is the real possibility that these nuclear technologies, fissile materials, or even fully assembled nuclear weapons, could find their way to terrorists.
Moreover, the September 11th Commission reported that al-Qaeda had been trying to acquire or build nuclear weapons for well over a decade. Former CIA Director George Tenet said that Osama bin Laden sees the acquisition of WMD as a "religious obligation."
GOVERNOR ROMNEY: "The Iranian regime threatens not only Israel, but also every other nation in the region, and ultimately the world. And that threat would take on an entirely new dimension if Iran were allowed to become a nuclear power. And just think of the signal a nuclear Iran would send to other rogue regimes with nuclear ambitions - this could be the tipping point in the development and proliferation of nuclear regimes." (Governor Mitt Romney, Remarks At The Seventh Annual Herzliya Conference, 1/23/2007)
The Romney Plan:
Governor Romney Believes We Must Expand And Accelerate Efforts To Combat Nuclear Terrorism By Taking The Following Actions.
Issues / Combating Nuclear Terrorism
Reasons to agree:
Reasons to disagree
4. False. Obama turns 47 on August 4, and if elected would be the 5th youngest person to be president. In fact he will be over 4 years older than Teddy Roosevelt was when he was sworn in after McKinley's assassination, and older than JFK, Clinton, and Grant were when elected. Where are you getting your facts?
Reasons to agree
Reasons to agree
Michael Gaynor Michael Gaynor
January 29, 2008
When Ted Kennedy enthusiastically endorsed Barack Hussein Obama for President of the United States, Ted (1) chided Harry Truman for saying that JFK was too young in 1960 and (2) proclaimed that Barack is a bit older than Teddy Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton, when they became President.
What Ted (and the media) ignored is that Harry Truman had a point. The Cuban Missile Crisis resulted from Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev's impression, as a result of the Bay of Pigs fiasco and a personal meeting with JFK in Vienna, that JFK would not be strong enough to keep the Soviet Union from installing long-range nuclear missiles in Cuba. Yes, JFK got those missiles out, after taking the world to the brink of nuclear war, and only gave up some American missiles in Turkey in the bargain. But the truth is that JFK was NOT ready to be President on Day One, as the Bay of Pigs fiasco itself conclusively demonstrated. Instead of a successful operation, or no operation, JFK bungled the long-planned liberation of Cuba from the dictatorship of Fidel Castro as badly as possible: by allowing the attack to begin and then denying air cover to the would-be Cuban liberators.
In addition, Barack is no TR, or JFK, or even Bill Clinton.
Barack was an associate attorney with Miner, Barnhill & Galland (three years), a lecturer of constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School (eleven years) and an Illinois state senator (eight years) before being elected to the United States Senate in 2004.
Teddy Roosevelt is the youngest person ever to become President. He became President at age 42 after the assassination of President McKinley.
Right, TR was Vice President before he became President.
Before TR became Vice President, he served as (1) Governor or New York, (2) Assistant Secretary of the Navy, (3) an Army Lieutenant Colonel and Colonel who organized and led his "Rough Riders" during the Spanish-American War, (4) president of the Board of New York City Police Commissioners, (5) a United States Civil Service Commissioner and (6) a New York State Assemblyman who wrote more bills than any other New York state legislator.
Wikipedia: "Roosevelt became president of the board of New York City Police Commissioners in 1895. During the two years he held this post, Roosevelt radically reformed the police department. The police force was reputed as one of the most corrupt in America. NYPD's history division records Roosevelt was, 'an iron-willed leader of unimpeachable honesty, (who) brought a reforming zeal to the New York City Police Commission in 1895.'Roosevelt and his fellow commissioners established new disciplinary rules, created a bicycle squad to police New York's traffic problems and standardized the use of pistols by officers. Roosevelt implemented regular inspections of firearms, annual physical exams, appointed 1,600 new recruits based on their physical and mental qualifications and not on political affiliation, opened the department to ethnic minorities and women, established meritorious service medals, and shut down corrupt police hostelries."
Barack surely is no TR!
Like TR, JFK was the second son of Joseph P. Kennedy and, as such, very well prepared for the Presidency, especially after his older brother, Joseph, died in World War II. A war hero himself, JFK served after the war as a Congressman (six years) and a United States Senator (eight years) before being elected America's second youngest President.
Barack is no JFK.
Bill Clinton, America's third youngest President, served as a University of Arkansas law professor, Attorney General (two years) and Governor of Arkansas (twelve years) before being elected President in 1992.
Barack is no Bill Clinton either.
5. "Obama has never accomplished anything outside of the classroom." What is this supposed to mean? He has state senator, US senator, a successful attorney, director of a successful community development program in chicago, and held several different non-academic positions prior to going to Law School. He is a father, and a husband. How can you possibly say he has never accomplished anything outside of the classroom. Please back up your statement.
6. "Obama has never had a job in the marketplace." See above. He worked at Eldridge Hayne's Business International Corporation, and it was not an internship. If Romney can use his time in France as experience that contributes to his candidacy, why can't Obama use a post-collegiate job?
7. "Obama has never run an organization." He was president of the Harvard Law Review, which is pretty much like being the head of a major magazine, only held to a higher standard. He ran Developing Communities Project in Chicago. If you know anything about how government offices work you would know that running a Senate office is pretty much like running a business. There is a staff, there is a budget, you hire, you fire. And of course a presidential campaign is an incredible organization.
8-12 See above. Senator is the boss. Director is the boss. President is the boss.
13-14. I love that your supporting "facts" for why Obama isn't experienced is "Obama just isn't experienced". This is brilliant logic.
I am not a Bill Maher fan either, but not all experience is equal. So Bush had 8 years of political experience, at the state level. Obama had 7 years at the state level in the Illinois senate (also a very populous state, representing part of the 3rd largest city in the country), plus will have had 4 years in the US Senate. Bush had 8 years of executive branch experience, Barack 0.
Barack has 4 years of foreign policy experience, Bush 0 at that time (same as Romney).
I think the point that Maher is making (poorly, I admit) is that there is no broad brush of "experience" than can be painted onto candidates. There are no specific pre-req's for the presidency (other than age, citizenship and US Birth), so to say one candidate is more experienced than another is not a simple issue of addition. If that were the case then we would all just vote for the most "experienced" candidate, McCain
Obama quotes JFK that we should never negotiate out of fear, but that we should never fear to negotiate. He then says that he would have one on one meetings with the president of Iran. Like a lot of things Barak says, this is very idealist and naĂŻve.
It is not fear that keeps us from negotiating with the president of Iran, but honor. The president of Iran kills intellectuals, tortures political opponents, crushes anyone who writes something in a newspaper or blog that is seen as criticizing him. You don't sit down for a photo-opportunity and coffee with THE GUY who supports Hezbollah, funds insurgents in Iraq, denies the old holocaust, but promises a brand new holocaust.
It is honor for the dead that he has killed and wants to kill that keeps us from speaking to the president of Iran. It is respect for the political prisoners that have been silenced that keeps us from having a photo-op with the president of Iran. It is respect for a free press that keeps us from having coffee with the president of Iran. It is HOPE for a future that is not dominated by religious extremest, that keeps us from meeting with the president of Iran. It is not fear.
Look at that forehead! Me 1977 |
James, July 2004 |
And then there were 3. 2004. |
Megan high on pain medicine and so happy to have her little girl. |
Not sure if I should share this sort of messy photos? |
Alison changed when Megan had to stay in the Hospital for 2 weeks, and was on bed rest for 2-1/2 months. She was going through some major separation anxiety or something. She was so happy to see Megan. |
2010. James loves his little brother so much, and was happy to bring him home. |
And then there were 5 |
Laub, boy |
One excerpt:
But voting on the basis of electability is often a fool's errand. Right now, Romney looks like a long-shot in November. He should be an attractive candidate -- smart, knowledgeable, good looking, extremely articulate -- but he's run into voter resistance even among conservatives because of his flip-flops, possibly his religion, and a general failure to connect. If he overcomes these problems and defeats McCain the rest of the way, then he'll have done enough to establish his potential electability to my satisfaction. If he doesn't, the issue will be moot.
Meanwhile, Republicans should not take too much comfort from McCain's performance in polls against Clinton and Obama this far from November. The McCain I saw in the California debate last week didn't look particularly electable. With the economy emerging as the overwhelmingly central issue in the campaign, with McCain's nasty streak increasingly on display, and with his reputation for straight-talk diminishing before our eyes, I'm not prepared to base a vote for the Senator on electability.
The decision thus comes down to policy and effectiveness. I give Romney the edge on both counts.
"I found out today that President Bush may not support my candidacy, and the reason specifically is because I don't share his liberal views on immigration amnesty. He wants to make it easy on illegal immigrants to stay in the this country, as does Senator McCain who proved it with his amnesty bill in the senate, and I'm a strict reconstructionist on the issue of this country's sovereignty and right to keep its borders secure."