Response to Daylights Mark

HT: Belmont Club

I was only planning on writing a few lines in response to your article. Then it kind of snowballed to the point where I didn’t want to hog the comments area. So I linked it on my blog, I hope you don’t mind.

Sometimes it seems like half the country is making an irrational choice for their presidential candidate. It is nice to see somebody make a rational explanation of their vote for Obama on something other than “Hope” and “Change”, but as a (reluctant) McCain voter myself, I can’t help but see a couple of points where your logic looks a little fuzzy.

Iraq/Iran
I am glad to see you share the same general opinion of Iraq as most of us, that I would paraphrased generally as “I wish we didn’t have to do this, but after 9/11 we cannot take the risk that Saddam would pass on chemical/biological/nuclear technologies or weapons to terrorist allies, Plus he is an offensive advocate for military opportunism in the Middle East, Plus he is a cancer that sits astride the major blood/oil vessel of the world economy, Plus he has never abided by the terms of the cease-fire that ended his first little attempt at expanding his empire. So we will take this action, get a democratic government that will not foster terrorism set up in his place, and quietly leave as soon as practical.”

And I agree with you that McCain’s view of the Iraq war is much like this. And that Hillary’s taking this general view was much more based on opportunity than on her actual feelings.

But Obama has stated from the very beginning that we should not be there, and should leave as fast as possible. Only recently has the word “win” come into his vocabulary on this issue. If we leave the country with anything other than a functioning government with an effective military, it would not be more than a year before Iran would suddenly become much larger. And to claim that somehow a soft-peddling on the Iranian nuclear issue was a quid-pro-quo to get the Iranians to quit sending men and arms to the insurgents is most likely quite wrong, and quite possibly backwards. The Iranian leaders know that Bush has been quite serious about the issue, trying to prove the opposite with a UN report (ha!), and a quickly debunked travesty of a NIE is weak. The truth is there is little we can do to stop the Iranians from getting “The Bomb” short of a massive bombing campaign across their entire country, of which there is almost no national will on our part to do. Israel however, being the target, may not be as reluctant, and lacks the air force to carry out such a campaign without using nukes. Yes I expect this to become bloody. No I do not see an easy answer.


Economy
I have *no* clue on how the bailout is going to help/hurt, if it is better to set up a government insurance plan (Newt) or a giant mortgage wash-and-scrub system (Paulson). But I do know that the first thing the Democrats did when they got their hands on the bill was to immediately pork it up with handouts to ACORN and their other little buddies, and advocate allowing judges to re-write mortgage contracts (as if mortgages were not variable enough in value as is). Which President do you think would have the nerve to veto that kind of idiocy?

Fiscal Policy
There is no way in the world that Obama can take office and push his economic plan without a pocket of Magic Pixie Tax Dust. Right now the top 50% of incomes pay over 98% of all income tax. He claims he will cut taxes for all the “middle class” taxpayers, I believe that as much as I believed Bill Clinton’s plan of the same claim, which within the first month of him taking office turned into the largest tax increase in US history. In order to enact even a fraction of what he has promised, he is either going to have to tax the rich into poverty, or run the taxes behind a cover plan such as a massive tax on companies, that gets passed on to the consumer. And you can not claim that McCain will tax less, I have no confidence in his ability to even maintain the Bush tax cuts while facing a Democrat dominated legislature. They are going to expire, and it will hurt the economy when they do. But at least McCain has shown a history of being a cheap (censored) sonofa(censored) in his voting record and promises, as opposed to Obama.

Health Care
I have issues with both candidates too, but Obama’s health care plan is almost a photocopy of the HillaryCare plan from the 90s, only mandatory instead of voluntary. The last thing I want is “Here is your Government created health care plan, you have no options, we have already docked your pay for it, goodbye”. McCain’s plan at least makes some sense, historically we have forced each company to provide their own individual health plan, McCain tends to a plan that would give everybody the option to have their own individual plan they can carry with them from job to job and into retirement, much like a 401K/IRA.

Governor Palin
All of the negative points you list about Gov. Palin sound like they came right off the DNC website. She’s a sitting Governor of the only state we have that borders two foreign governments, who has a sky-high approval rating in Alaska, who has strong feelings on abortion and God, and has shown as governor that she will not cram them down your throat. She has defeated two former governors, managed to get that natural gas pipeline going without the massive state spending her predecessor wanted, and has not even crested fifty years old yet. For crying out loud, she has more executive experience than either presidential candidates. The Obama camp is scared stiff of her and has unleashed the most slime-filled campaign of hatred and bias that I have seen, up to and including professionally produced videos from Obama’s PR firm. And she is maintaining her “chirpy” demeanor during it all. God bless her.

Trivia: If Obama supports off-shore drilling, that’s news to me. Last Democrat I saw supporting off-shore drilling was that useless plan that only allowed drilling more than 50 miles off the coast, and did not permit any revenue sharing with the state. Since 95% of our off-shore resources are within 50 miles of the coast, and states will not be very cooperative to drilling without getting something in return, it went down like a dead duck.

The whole campaign season has felt a little like watching two little boys: one with a stick trying to knock his kite out of the power lines, and one playing in the flooded creek.

Update 10/15/08 in response to his response:

I do think you are doing yourself a disservice by accepting the Media's portrayal of Palin as some sort of backwards Alaskan while accepting the carefully crafted glowing image of Obama that they have put forth. Both of them are quite effective politicians, one who managed to capture a Senate seat almost bloodlessly by short-sheeting his opponents, the other who ran a populist campaign against former governors and beat 'em both. Both of them are short-timers, having less than one complete term in a state-wide elected position. But Palin will be Vice-president, a position that has become somewhat of an apprenticeship program, and only once in my lifetime has become a sudden promotion. Obama will become President, and will draw from his friends and co-workers for his Presidential staff.

After seeing who he has made friends with on his trip up the ladder, that does not make me want him in command, quite the contrary.

--Georg Felis