Tag: President

Crossposted at Daily Kos

What I wanna know is this: historically speaking, who’s supporting whom?  With conflicting signals coming from all over the blogosphere, I have compiled a simple guide for undecided voters so that they can make an informed decision tomorrow aka “The Mother of All Election Days.”

No need to read intricate health care proposals.  Or, trying to figure out who’s for or against granting drivers licenses to undocumented aliens.  Or, agonizing over as to who has more experience or better judgment.  Or, wasting your precious time listening to talking heads on this or that cable news show.  Or, keeping track of which of the numerous Kennedys is for Obama or for Hillary.    

Folks, it ain’t that difficult to figure all of this out.  

Simply read my one-minute guide and I’m hopeful that you’ll do the right thing.  

In the middle of the mandate pie-fight (which just had a big ole can of gas dumped on it today by Paul Krugman), I think it’s important for folks to understand that – mandates aside – there’s still issues with both Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s health care plans that need to be addressed. I’m going to pick the big, blank area of each plan that leaves it open to attack, because my primary goal is to have a viable universal health care plan introduced by whoever wins the Democratic nomination (and then hopefully the presidency) as quickly as possible.

Crossposted at Daily Kos

In a stunning political development this evening according to the Associated Press, the Florida Supreme Court has intervened in the Florida Republican Primary and declared George W. Bush the winner over Mitt Romney, John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, and Mike Huckabee.

Senator John McCain, ever the patriot and loyal soldier, had this response

I knew in my heart of hearts that I’d never be able to win in a state full of geezers.  Even so, I’m delighted that the prize deservedly went to President Bush.  In anticipation of this development, I hopped on a plane to Washington, DC and personally congratulated the President. The voters of Florida have chosen wisely.

Raw Story now reports on its front page that Rush Limbaugh may not support any of the Republican presidential candidates. It seems that the right-wing political movement is now in its last throes, seeing that there is no clear favorite in the race and none of the current candidates can unite them like Ronald Reagan did.

And Limbaugh is hardly the only gatekeeper who may sit out this race. The Republican Party is controlled by many gatekeepers, including Dobson, Norquist, and many others. Dobson, for instance, has refused to give his blessing to Mitt Romney, John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, or Fred Thompson. The fact of the matter is that the social conservatives who provide the boots on the ground only have one candidate — Ron Paul, who meets their purity tests on abortion, gays, gun control, immigration, and taxes. Paul does not have the blessing of one of the key wings of the Republican Party — the defense hawks and neocons, given his opposition to Iraq. However, the fact that he is the only antiwar voice in the GOP and 34% or so of Republicans do not approve of Bush’s handling of Iraq means that he is competitive.

A picture sometimes really is worth a thousand words…

Rassmussen conducts a daily national tracking poll of all presidential candidates. The latest shows John Edwards picking up significantly more support, since the beginning of the year, than any candidate of either party.

The percent change for Republicans is: Huckabee 18.8% / Giuliani 13.3% / McCain 11.8% / Thompson 8.3% / Romney -6.3%.

So why isn’t this news?

photo courtesy of SEIU International on Flickr used under this Creative Commons license.

So far I have wrote about Barack Obama’s strong stands on public financing of elections and media reform. Today I am going to talk about his work making government more transparent and more ethical. These are area’s were he has gotten the most bills passed into law so hopefully this should be a interesting post.  

Yesterday I wrote about the need for systematic change in this country and why Barack Obama had the best plan and record to accomplish that of any of the candidates running. In that diary I talked about his support for public financing of elections and the bills he had introduced to make that a reality with progressive champion Russ Feingold. Since I wrote that I have found out he introduced a bill to publicly finance elections in the Illinois State Senate too. Hard to still make the claim that he is only doing this to win votes.

There is a old saying in the media reform movement “if media is not your number one issue, it has to be your second issue.” In this post I am going to focus on my second issue, media reform.  

I have been interested in politics for two years at most. I have only become a political geek as of the last few months. Over that time I have become convinced that we need real progressive change to lift up this country and make it great again. I have also become convinced that to do that we need real, systematic change. That can mean a lot of things but in this case I am talking about changing the way the political process works. To make a progressive America we need full public financing of elections for all elections. We need media reform that will restore balance and reason to the political debate in our country. We need a transparent government so the people can hold the politicians accountable. We need election reform to insure all political voices have a say and that everyone who wants to vote can vote. We need to reign in the power of corporate lobbyists.

In short we need to close all the loopholes that allow the rich and powerful in this country to have a larger say in democracy then average people.  I believe that out of all the candidates running Barack Obama is the one who will do the most to implement these systematic reforms.

Yesterday LithiumCola wrote about the Boston Globe’s questionnaire about Executive Power. S/he wrote about the strong answers Senator Obama gave. We’ll I thought I’d focus a diary just on his answers and not just on the two questions LC highlighted. The questionnaire is quite informative and gives you a good look at were the canidates stand. All except Fred Thomson who was asleep and Rudy Giuliani who was day dreaming about 9/11.  

Today Public Citizen released a new report “Santa’s Sweatshop ‘Made in DC’ by Bad Trade Deals”. According to the report toy safety problems have skyrocketed as major U.S. toy corporations relocated their production overseas to exploit sweatshop wages in countries where they cannot ensure the safety of the products.  Thankfully the good folks at Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch has put together a easy to use petition to the presidental candidates that simply says this:

Our current imported toy safety crisis is a symptom of race-to-the-bottom globalization. We need new trade policies that protect our kids and support strong consumer safety protections – not trade deals like NAFTA and WTO that promote the relocation of toy production overseas to venues where safety cannot be ensured.

The U.S. President has the power to ensure U.S. trade policy doesn’t undermine the safety of children at play. Urge the candidates to oppose provisions in trade deals that provide special benefits and protections for manufacturers to produce goods in other countries and limit U.S. border inspection and imported product safety standards. Also urge the candidates to provide greater funding for domestic agencies responsible for product safety.

That sound sensible to you? Join me below the fold to learn more about the issue and how to take action.