Time to Choose Wisely

Now that the American people know who their two main presidential candidates' running mates are, the choice for these United States of America is clear: Will it be the Barack Obama/Joe Biden Axis, or the John McCain/Sarah Palin Alliance?

Senators Obama and Biden are known for being their Party's men; they speak of change, but care more about their ideology's interests than their Nation's. Anyone who glances at Obama's time in office, who buys into the BS that he'll bring America together, will be disappointed by one of the most left-wing, partisan Senatorial records...on record. And Barack Obama's not even finished his first term! However, looking at the record of the GOP candidates, Arizona Senator McCain and Alaska Gov. Palin, they often take the maverick course against the Party faithful's wishes. In a country originally founded by rebels, we should remember - even though our command of our own history these days is atrocious - that this is not necessarily a bad thing.

There's an inherent weakness in the Democrats camp. Supposedly, theirs is the progressive party, yet they've chosen a candidate who represents the Democratic commitment to the left-wing's ideological status quo. Where's the Change there? Obama, for all his rhetorical finery, is a politician's politician, revealing little of what he really feels but saying what he thinks the voters want to hear (even if he doesn't mean it). The mystery around him is thus real, but the aura is false. He's done a terrific - laudable, even - job of selling himself, but seems to forget that employers these days - and in this case, I speak of the American people - like knowing as much as they can about their prospective employees. Not just the good stuff.

So far, the only thing Americans really know about Obama is that he's a left-winger who doesn't finish what he starts; if he did, he'd have checked his rabid ambition and waited until finishing a term in the Senate before seeking higher office.

Also hampering the Democrats is the palpable sense that they feel they are entitled to the White House.

After eight years of Bush, they think their "suffering", their psuedo-martyrdom at the hands of Republicans and the Bush Administration, has earned them the right to not only gain the Executive Branch, but extend their control of the Legislative. Sure, they celebrate the first-ever nomination of an African-American as a major party's presidential candidate, but then they contradict themselves - show their hypocrisy - by stating that what is important is not Senator Obama's skin color, but his message of Change. But since Obama's banner of Change is carried about on a flagpole called "false hope", because Obama is something of an enigma, they call attention whenever possible to skin color and mixed heritage of the freshman Senator of Illinois.

They think they're entitled to get away with it.

But despite the state of Education in the United States today, Americans are not stupid. They know they have ample reasons to distrust Senator Obama. They see how popular he is in Europe, but remember that it isn't Europeans who will be voting at the polls in November. Bigotry has little, or nothing, to do with their wariness regarding Obama. The shark in the water will only show his dorsal fin as he skims the surface of the water; Obama is only showing Americans...well, the scariest part of himself - the ideologue. Americans are finally starting to realize again what figures such as James Madison knew hundreds of years ago: That unbending partisanship, an unbending commitment to your Party's ideology, contributes to America's problems rather than ameliorates them.

And for this reason, Independents are, so far, the biggest chink in the Democrats' supposedly polished, impenetrable armor. The principles that Senator John McCain of Arizona and Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska live by as politicians and human beings are the result of the lives they've lived, not merely of the Party they're members of. Unlike Senator Obama, whose partisanship can be counted on, and Senator Biden, McCain and Palin aren't known for playing it safe for their images' sake. They don't always adhere to the Republican Party's script. Obama might have lived an unconventional life, and Democrats can play that up, but then, so have McCain and Palin lived unconventional lives! The difference is, Obama and Biden are conventional politicians. McCain and Palin aren't.

Like it or not, this difference will make a difference in the minds of independent voters. Moreover, it will also make a difference in the minds of voters such as myself, an independent-minded registered Republican, and even Democrats who aren't sold on Obama or are disappointed with Hillary Clinton's defeat. Americans need not, should not, place their hopes on any set of politicians, right-wing or left-wing, conservative or liberal. They should, however, be able to place their confidence in their politicians, to be confident about them. Hope is a vague feeling, a general positiveness without much focus. Confidence, though also a feeling, is focused and reassuring. Those who merely have hope for the future are fatalistic; those who are confident about it know they have reason to be.

Senators Obama and Biden (Osama bin Laden? Nah...but close) say "It's time to change America." Their diagnosis of the problem is wrong. It's not America that needs to change, but the status quo in Washington. Liberlas are more intransigent in their ideas than conservatives. I'm confident that though Obama/Biden's rhetoric might not yet be seen for the sham it is, as Election Day nears, more and more people will come to their senses. Change in administration, as I've said in previously, comes not from any particular candidate, but is mandated by the Constitution. But if change can come via a candidate, I don't see change in another president from Illinois and a vice president from Delaware.

But a President from Arizona?

And a Vice President from Alaska?

That would be different, wouldn't it?