Why I support Obama

I received an email from an ol' College Buddy about why I support Obama and wanted to share:) Oh and I know there are probably misspellings and gramatical errors all over the place - but I only have 2 minutes left in my lunch!

Kim,
You're a bright/smart/up-to-date woman...tell me why should I be behind Obama?? I'm not giving you "shit" I simply don't follow politics as much as I need to.
What about McCain, what's his story.
Would love it if you could bring me up to speed and make me not so ignorant. (think its possible?) =)
November is approaching quickly.
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The first advice I always give people is to pick your top 3 issues and discover what each candidate thinks about them. Choose from there.


I take my politics very seriously (really, I have been learning about Obama since his keynote in 2004). Here are the reasons I support him.

The top 3 three things I look for in a candidate are:
Pro-Choice: This one speaks for itself - but I'll still defend it. The decision to offer choice to women with their own medical care is different than condoning abortion. Do I think abortion is wrong? Yes. However, what I think is more wrong is the idea that we can impose our values and morals on other people and the decisions that affect thier lives and sometimes even their health. Most republican led bills that pledge to end late term abortion DO NOT include "exclusion clauses" that protect a mothers life is she could die from childbirth. That is wrong. How about forcing a child or woman who just experienced the worst thing a woman ever could - being raped- and then forcing them to hash out that pain day in and day out for 9 months. That is just plain wrong.


Regulated Trade as opposed to FREE Trade: While I think trade and the globalization are important, America should export as much as it imports - if not more. Currently we import over 30 billion dollars more than we export. We'll never keep american jobs this way. Another point on this topic (since it seems like all we export anymore are jobs) is that currently we give companies who send jobs overseas tax incentives to do so. Barack Obama will end those breaks, and instead give them to companies who open and stay here.

Taxes: Usually, this one would be the environment, but after GWB I moved this one up. GWB's tax cuts only cut taxes for people who make over 250,000/year. Barack Obama will repeal this tax code, and give people who make less than 250,000/year the tax incentive - plus has plans to give each family a 1,000(i think) tax rebate to offset energy costs.GasI know I said 3 but I feel strongly about this one this time around too! While I am not 100% against off-shore drilling we have a problem and T Boone Pickens (oil tycoon) admits it too. USA consumes 25% of the worlds oil and our land only provides 3%. I due time, we will run out of American Oil. We need leadership who will not only help us now, but will help our future. We need to seriously invest in finding alternative sources of energy. Obama not only plans to invest hundreds of millions into this, because of the type of energy he is looking into (solar power, windmill) all of the jobs will be in American and he estimates it will take 5 million people to make that happen. Using 2006 CIA numbers, we have 15 million unemployed americans.

There are many other reasons I support Obama. As far as Commander in Chief responsibilities here are two:

He was one of the first people to recomend a timeline to leave Iraq, and the Bush administration and McCain both opposed the idea. The Bush administration just adopted a timeline to leave by 2011. It's basically the same timeline Obama proposed.

He said he would sit down and speak with Iran and use diplomatic efforts to stop their nucleur proliferation. The Bush administration / McCain had a field day with this calling him soft and out of touch with reality. Less than a month later the Bush administration sent Condeleeza Rice over to meet with Iran.

McCain has voted with Bush 77% of the time in the last 7 years (since Bush has been president) 90% of the time in 2007 and he says the fundamentals of our economy are strong and doesn't think that 47 million people without Healthcare is a problem. He supports bailing out the banks who are stuck with millions in foreclosure debt, but doesn't support changing bankruptcy laws that plague the thousands of people who lost thier homes due to predatory lending (ARM loans are predatory!).

I could go on forever and it probabaly seems like I have, but like I said, I'm a bit of fanatic:)

Oh and one more thing (I promise) while Obama is criticized for being a celebrity - I think it is awesome to finally have a politician and leader that can draw a crowd of 75,000 to one place to watch him speak. I think we need more popular people in politics. I prefer that to the stale same same ol distrust we have in everyone else.