No matter what party you are --this is a must read
Something to think about, an article by a Black Columnist.
Ken Blackwell - Columnist for the New York Sun
It's an amazing time to be alive in America. We're in a year of firsts in
this presidential election: the first viable woman candidate; the first
viable African-American candidate; and, a candidate who is the first
frontrunning freedom fighter over 70. The next president of America will
be a first.
We won't truly be in an election of firsts, however,
until we judge every candidate by where they stand. We won't arrive where
we should be until we no longer talk about skin color or gender.
Now that Barack Obama steps to the front of the
Democratic field, we need to stop talking about his race, and start
talking about his policies and his politics.
The reality is this: Though the Democrats will not have
a nominee until August, unless Hillary Clinton drops out, Mr. Obama is now
the frontrunner, and its time America takes a closer and deeper look at
him.
Some pundits are calling him the next John F. Kennedy.
He's not. He's the next George McGovern. And it's time people learned the
facts.
Because the truth is that Mr. Obama is the single most liberal senator in
the entire U.S. Senate. He is more liberal than Ted Kennedy, Bernie
Sanders, or Mrs. Clinton.
Never in my life have I seen a presidential frontrunner
whose rhetoric is so far removed from his record. Walter Mondale promised
to raise our taxes, and he lost. George McGovern promised military
weakness, and he lost. Michael Dukakis promised a liberal domestic agenda,
and he lost.
Yet Mr. Obama is promising all those things, and he's not behind in the
polls. Why? Because the press has dealt with him as if he were in a beauty
pageant.
Mr. Obama talks about getting past party, getting past red and blue, to
lead the United States of America. But let's look at the more defined
strokes of who he is underneath this superficial 'beauty.'
Start with national security, since the president's most
important duties are as commander-in-chief. Over the summer, Mr. Obama
talked about invading Pakistan, a nation armed with nuclear weapons;
meeting without preconditions with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who vows to
destroy Israel and create another Holocaust; and Kim Jong II, who is
murdering and starving his people, but emphasized that the nuclear option
was off the table against terrorists - something no president has ever
taken off the table since we created nuclear weapons in the 1940s. Even
Democrats who have worked in national security condemned all of those
remarks. Mr. Obama is a foreign-policy novice who would put our national
security at risk.
Next, consider economic policy. For all its faults, our
health care system is the strongest in the world. And free trade
agreements, created by Bill Clinton as well as President Bush, have made
more goods more affordable so that even people of modest means can live a
life that no one imagined a generation ago. Yet Mr. Obama promises to
raise taxes on 'the rich.' How to fix Social Security? Raise taxes. How to
fix Medicare? Raise taxes. Prescription drugs? Raise taxes. Free college?
Raise taxes. Socialize medicine? Raise taxes. His solution to everything
is to have government take it over. Big Brother on steroids, funded by
your paycheck.
Finally, look at the social issues. Mr. Obama had the
audacity to open a stadium rally by saying, 'All praise and glory to God!'
but says that Christian leaders speaking for life and marriage have
'hijacked' - hijacked - Christianity. He is pro-partial birth abortion,
and pr omises to appoint Supreme Court justices who will rule any
restriction on it unconstitutional. He espouses the abortion views of
Margaret Sanger, one of the early advocates of racial cleansing. His
spiritual leaders endorse homosexual marriage, and he is moving in that
direction. In Illinois, he refused to vote against a statewide ban - ban -
on all handguns in the state. These are radical left, Hollywood, and Sa n
Francisco values, not Middle America values.
The real Mr. Obama is an easy target for the general
election. Mrs. Clinton is a far tougher opponent. But Mr. Obama could win
if people don't start looking behind his veneer and flowery speeches. His
vision of 'bringing America together' means saying that those who disagree
with his agenda for America are hijackers or warmongers. Uniting the
country means adopting his liberal agenda and abandon ing any conflicting
beliefs.
But right now everyone is talking about how eloquent of
a speaker he is and - yes - they're talking about his race. Those should
never be the factors on which we base our choice for president. Mr.
Obama's radical agenda sets him far outside the American mainstream, to
the left of Mrs. Clinton.
It's time to talk about the real Barack Obama. In an election of firsts,
let's first make sure we elect the person who is qualified to be our
president in a nuclear age during a global civilizational war.
