In reference to my last post regarding who you would vote for, I have decided that I think a new political party needs to be formed. It could be called the "Repubocrats." It would be a decent combination of both current major political parties, the Republicans and the Democrats.
This is where they would stand on the issues.
Education: Believes to NCLB is not working and that the states should be in charge of testing. Also believes that any federal money that is sent should be done with fewer strings attached.
Abortion: is pro choice.
Immigration: Believes in a path to citizenship for those already in the country, but also supports tightening border security.
Economy: supports fair and equal trade and keeping American businesses competitive.
Energy: supports renewable energies and reducing foreign oil dependence.
Foreign Policy: supports more monitoring of nuclear technology.
Climate: agrees that the planet is warming, but is skeptical about whether or not the cause(s) are man made.
Gun control: opposes most, if not all restrictions.
Social Security: opposes any plan that cuts benefits, is skeptical about (but willing to discuss) privatizing.
Same Sex Marriage: supports it. No questions asked.
Embryonic stem cell research: supports it. No questions asked.
At least then I would know who to vote for. I guess in the end, it is highly unlikely that there would ever be a single person who would fit the mold of what I think a president should be. It probably comes down to finding the one or two issues I am most passionate about, and finding someone who fits that mold.
*Update* Silly me forgot to include one of the major issues being discussed in this campaign...health care.
Health care: agrees that everyone should have access to health care/insurance, but doesn't make not carrying insurance a crime.
Point by point in a "how things more or less are now" perspective:
ReplyDeleteCheck - really the feds shouldn't be involved.
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Er... ITYM free trade.
Since government has been involved in encouraging one way or the other and disrupting the market, if we have to keep up, light-handed encouragement is fine.
Not an easy thing to do, but yeah. And the other 99.9% of foreign policy issues?
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Benefits can't realistically go down for anyone depending on a currently projected amount. This is a tough thing and will require something like a 50 year rampdown to get us out of the mess, in a political environment that can't often follow one plan or policy longer than a few years. If Chile can do it, we can migrate to private. If you take the fact that I am already too old not to require some amount from SS, and I am near the end of the baby boomers, and the boomers are what will crash the thing beyond repair by sometime the 2020s, it's scary. Tackling it for real is going to be one of those profiles in courage things. Nobody will do it until it's becoming a disaster and harder to move gently on.
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I just realized the kids allowed me to write this entire long comment, despite Deb being in bed, and I should have been writing a post or doing a blog redesign; something from my list of things of consequence that must be done.
My "in an ideal world" positions:
ReplyDeleteGovernment at no level should have anything to do with education.
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Open flow of people across borders.
Free and unrestricted trade internally and externally, with no meddling.
Entirely up to the market.
Kind of meddlesome, and the genie is out of the bottle. I do consider preemption
See, this is more normal. Sadie is crying because I told her I wanted to finish typing this and wanted to be able to think. Oh well.