The more I learn about both of these guys, the more frightened I am at that prospect. Obama is simply not qualified, and moreover, does not have anything like a proper view of what a President should be. What Obama has going for him? He is Black and he is charismatic, and he is anti-Right. He will get many tens of millions of voters on each one of those three points.

McCain on the other hand is just about the MOST qualified Presidential candidate in the history of the game. But he is White, and he is elderly and slightly handicapped, and he is moderate-to-Right. He will lose many tens of millions of voters on each of those points.

Lets compare Obama to the most charismtic President of our past, John F. Kennedy. Lets say Obama, as he portrays himself in his speaking and writing today, had been President during the Cuban Missile Crisis (and ignore the fact that his race would have been a problem, just don't even consider that).

How would Obama (based on his rhetoric) have handled the Cuban Missile Crisis?

The world got very close to a nuclear war in those few weeks in 1963, and had it not been for Kennedy's combination of strength, willingness to use force if necessary, but also cool-headedness things might not have turned out so nice for anybody. Kennedy having served in combat was significantly more of a pragmatist than Obama portrays himself as being.

If we believe him, then what can we say about how he would handle that crisis? He very likely would not have shown a willingness to use force, something the Russians/Cubans would have perceived as weakness . . . While this might seem like an age old example, with an increasingly belligerent Russia, increasingly competitive totalitarian China, and regimes like Iran that are seeking to build nukes, this is not only a valid example it is a critical one for us Americans to think about in hiring our President.

Me personally, I'd prefer to have the guy who endured the worst the N Viet prison camp thugs could met out and still recovered to do great things, than a young fellow who has not even served as a real Mayor, but has lots of big ideas about what is wrong with the world and how he is the genius to fix it all. He sounds like a 17 year old for Pete's Sake!

But I think I might just vote for Obama simply to spite you!

Hey, if you want to cut off your nose to spite your face go ahead .  I always have this feeling with you Locus that you are not completely being candid about your opinions but you want to buck the pro McCainites on this site.  No need to end the sherade but based on the intellegence I sense from you (compliment, despite some of your drive by's ), I think I may have a sense of who you will pull the lever for in the end.  Mind you things may change but I don't think you're quite as pro Obama as you come across .

charisma is a good trait but it's not the only trait one needs to qualify for president.  There are plenty of people who have great charisma that are wonderful people but who would not be good presidents. 

Fencepost :p

jerm (9/4/2008)

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But I think I might just vote for Obama simply to spite you!

Hey, if you want to cut off your nose to spite your face go ahead .  I always have this feeling with you Locus that you are not completely being candid about your opinions but you want to buck the pro McCainites on this site.

Someone's got to play the devil's advocate, no? All my left of center friends, such as Ness, Seared, Bastable, etc. no longer post here in the political/philosophical discussions, so I am on my own here!

No need to end the sherade but based on the intellegence I sense from you (compliment, despite some of your drive by's ),

Thanks jerm. It's funny, because a couple of my liberal friends have referred to Bill O'Reilly as nothing less than the antichrist, and I am really not sure why. I have taken to him quite a bit (Rush on the other hand still disgusts me). He really is fair and balanced. You should have heard him yesterday, all the criticisms he was getting from those on the "right" who were calling his show because he will be running part of his interview with Obama about an hour before the McCain speech tonight. He was actually quite surprised Obama agreed to do the interview, but Obama strategically agreed to do the interview today to try and take some of the spotlight off McCain, and O'Reilly is going to air part of it tonight (before the McCain speech) and the rest of it next week. Anyways, he finally told one of his callers that he, as on objective journalist, is not in the business of promoting John McCain, and I really respect that.

Bill O'Reilly is someone who adheres to, as he defined it "Traditional Values" whereas I would be someone with more "Progressive Values". I like his way of framing it, as opposed to just "liberal vs. conservative."  So sure, I disagree with him (and conservative Republicans in general) on certain things.... and I guess I can at least see where my liberal friends would not like him, but, the "antichrist".....???? Please. No. Maybe because he actually takes his job seriously (and thus is a strong adversary), unlike someone like Rush Limbaugh or Lars Larrsson that you have a hard time taking seriously... I don't know.

I think I may have a sense of who you will pull the lever for in the end.  Mind you things may change but I don't think you're quite as pro Obama as you come across .

I would have pulled the lever for McCain over Gore in 2000, I am confident of that, I said so at the time, and I would do that in a heart beat. Unfortunately some son of a former president got in the way!!!! If I had to do it over, with my experience, I probably would have written in McCain anyways. Obama, to me, has more appeal than Al Gore, so the decision is a bit tougher. But unlike a lot of my liberal friends, McCain hasn't lost his appeal, it's the Republican party in general that makes me a bit squeamish. Really the Democratic party does too, but probably less than the Republicans.  

What I want to know is this, I heard Rudy G. and Sarah P. mocking Obama last night for work as a "community organizer". I don't know, but isn't "community organizer" service supposed to be a good thing? A way to help the poor without getting the government involved? Isn't that what Republicans want?  Wasn't MLK Jr. a very prominent community organizer?

Here is what it says on Wiki for Obama:

I really didn't like it when they were mocking him for that. It seemed very arrogant and condescending.

But in terms of qualifications for being the Chief Executive of the most powerful nation on Earth, and Commander in Chief of the same nation, I would prefer to see someone who has about 10 years in Congress, or at least 5 to 6 years as a Governor with a preceding 4 or 5 in more minor municipal roles (say being a Mayor of a city over 100,000. How long as Obama been a Senator?

Expereince helping and empowering people at the grassroots level is certainly experience that would be a refreshing change in a President; I doubt that many of them have that sort of background and this does distinguish Obama from the norm in that respect. But what about being able to handle the global dynamics? What about being able to handle the national dynamics? The Pres has a LOT of things to coordinate. He is not all powerful, and even with a fairly ineffectual or incompetent President (as the last few years show) it is not like the nation will grind to a halt and collapse. But an expert President, one who understands relating to the Governors, the Legislators, the Judicial figures, the military, the poewrful civilian lobbies, etc., etc. can leverage the influence which the President's job has to achieve a lot more than someone whose experience is primarily restricted to proximal and small-scale efforts to help the little guy, and some very big ideas.

I wish Obama had waited for another 4 to 8 years. In that time span, I think he could have really established himself as a major figure in the nation and have been a much more sure-fire candidate whom we could all be more or less equally enthusiastic about. As it is, I think he is rushing to aspire to a role that he MIGHT just be able to rise to, or he might struggle with.