Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna

Don't give up, Billie. There still may be a few who are willing to discuss their voting intentions and their reasons without resorting to bashing the other candidate or other participants in the Political Forum. If that proves incorrect, I too will use my time more productively and enjoyably. In past days I've been drawn into posting responses that are unproductive and I promise that won't happen again. So here we go...

Unless something changes a lot in the next month, I will very likely vote for Barack Obama.

Until the last Presidential election, I voted each and every time for the Republican candidate. (What's that eleven straight times before my first vote for a Democrat?) After voting for George Bush for his first term, I voted for John Kerry in 2004 because Bush performed--or failed to perform--significantly differently from the promises he made in his campaign for election in 2000. It became very apparent very soon after his inaguration that he consistently embraced only a few narrow issues of the far right wing ideaology--tax cutting and planting democracies. He did not embrace conservative principles such as smaller government and less government spending. Nor did he make much of an effort to meaningfully address some of the important problems facing the U.S.--an energy policy, healthcare, education. Through his Vice President and many of his appointees the Bush administration proved to be as devious and deceitful as it was ineffective. Almost more importantly, Bush embraced and even fueled the partisan polarization and increasing devisivness of our government.

I like John McCain very much. I would almost certainly vote for him except for three reasons...

-- He has "hired" and embraced the same political operatives that worked to elect George Bush and is employing the same purely negative approach to seeking election. I am offended by his avoidance of running the "high road " campaign that he promised at the outset of the primaries. I am turned off by the advice his campaign seems to be giving him--and he is accepting--to avoid discussion of the real issues and problems facing the country in favor of negative sniping and attempts at character assination. John McCain seems to have reversed his own "willing to lose the election but win the war" analogy, already failing to fulfill his promises even before his election the same way Bush did. I cannot vote for a repeat of that sort of an administration.

-- McCain's campaign handlers have used his reputation as a "maverick" heavily in his campaign, even in the selection of his VP candidate. That may seem a popular personality trait, but unfortunately his actions as a maverick have weakened his ability to bring together the fractured and polarized Congress. He seems almost equally disliked by the Democrats as well as many in his own party. I believe that a President capable of bringing the two parties together from the fringes towards the middle is more important now than at any time in decades. Barack Obama has the demeanor to do that and I feel more comfortable that he could be more effective in bringing our government together than the "maverick" McCain. There's a risk that Obama could become a Bush-like idealogue, but so far he's stated no intent of trying to move the country from a far right wing direction quickly to the left. In fact, many of the campaign promises of both candidates are eerily similar. Admittedly, he has a liberal Senate voting record and that is a concern. But I hope I'm right.

-- Lastly, with what is likely to be a heavily Democratic House and Senate, a Congress which is polarized to the far left and right, it is unlikely that McCain can or will accomplish much of anything legislatively in his first and probably only term in office. If he were elected I anticipate another four years of sniping and posturing and arguing with little being accomplished, even in the face of serious national problems and issues. That would be particularly true if McCain involved those who are running his election campaign in his administration, which would be likely. If Obama is elected he will be likely be able to get may things he feels are important addressed with legislation passed by his majority control of both houses of Congress. The risk in his election is that he will embrace an ideaology as far to the left as Bush was to the right with equally disastrous results. In the worst case scenario we'd be voting for another new President in 2012, like we probably would be anyway when a then 76-year old McCain would be unlikely to run for re-election. We could always vote out Obama if he proved dangerously and irresponsibly liberal and "start all over again". I hope that doesn't happen because I don't believe that the U.S. can afford yet another four years of ineffective and irresponsible governance.

So, you can see that my choice is a "lesser of two evils" choice. I suspect I may not be alone in favoring a "less undesirable" candidate and the frustrations that decision has caused me.