So, you’d rather have a strong leader to effectively change policy in directions you dislike, than a leader who ineffectively tries to change policy in ways you agree with?
Sounds like you are picking the worse of two evils. I’d much, much rather go slowly in the right direction (or stand still) than have an effective leader that works against what I believe in.
Nitpick: I’m pretty sure it was “deserve” neither.
Wait. Pick an issue. Any one you care about. As an example, I’ll pick abortion for myself, an issue I care deeply about. I’m pro-choice. Are you saying it makes sense for me to vote for someone who wants to make abortions illegal, because he has “good character”, whatever that means? Don’t you think it’s a teensy weensy bit more important for me to keep abortions legal?
No. I’m saying that I’ll prefer a leader who has strength of character and won’t get pushed around on the international stage. This works better in the American tripartite system than the British one.
What does this even mean? Can you give concrete examples of being “pushed around on the international stage”?
But obviously, you’d have to agree with him on international issues, right? You wouldn’t disagree with this hypothetical person completely.
In other words, you do care about issues, but you give foreign policy a much higher importance than domestic issues.
I don’t forgive Bush for not deploying every ship in the Pacific Fleet to the Yellow Sea, then tell North Korea and China, “Ok, let’s negotiate–for real this time.”
What a chicken hawk. And I stress chicken.
If Bush is your idea of “good character”, I shudder to think what you would call “bad character”.
How are Republicans anti education? The only major debates I know about education
Neither side seems “anti-education” to me.
There’s a name for someone who lobs a stink bomb then retreats.
We’re hijacking Bill’s thread, but no. I’ve said what I’ve said and it means no more. Don’t extrapolate to what isn’t there.
It’s pretty relevant to the thread and not a hijack, IMO. And I’m just trying to understand your opinion, it makes no sense to me.
Please elaborate on how a leader can gain your vote by not “pushed around on the international stage”, yet also not act on foreign policies you support? Can you give an example, a hypothetical one even? I cannot think of any reasonable situation where a leader would do something related to foreign policy opposite of how I feel they should be done, yet somehow I support them on it for “not being pushed around”.
This whole thread is bullshit.
It’s obvious that Bill and qts are going to vote for Bush because they’re idiots. They’re just embarrassed to admit that they like what Bush represents, so they’re blaming Kerry rather than publicly embrace Bush. “Character” indeed. :rolleyes:
I’d be pretty surprised if qts voted for Bush, what with him being British and all.
I can give you a smaller example than for President.
I interned for a Senator in the state legislature last year. He was a Republican from a rural area of Kansas and, I disagreed with a number of positions he held. For starters, he introduced a bill on English as the national language. There were a number of other positions I disagreed with him on as well.
But you know, he was actually a nice guy. And, more importantly, while I disagreed with some of his decisions, I understood why he made them. Sometimes he did it because he was representing a constituent and his or her needs. Sometimes he did it because this was what he truly believed was in the best interest of the district he represented.
So I feel it’s possible to still vote for someone based upon the content of his character and not necessarily because his viewpoint coincides completely with yours. Of course, the difference between my example and the ones previously listed is that the things he and I disagreed on were not hot button/make or break issues for me. I’m not sure how I would have felt about voting for him had they been.
Whatever. You know exactly what I mean.
If you didn’t disagree with him on “hot button/make or break” issues, then the example really is irrelevant to the thread. These folks seem to support politicians even though they disagree with them on nearly all or perhaps all important issues, because of “character issues”. That’s what what boggles my mind.
He could probably still vote in Florida.
I just want to say that threads like this would be pretty pointless if choie was running Kerry’s campaign. Kerry would have a solid double digit lead and would be a shoo-in for at least 350 electoral votes.
Well, how about you offer a reason why I should vote for Kerry other than, “He’s not Bush”? The unwarranted insults aimed at Bush and those who do not support the Democrats do the Democrats a great deal of harm. Bush is not stupid - he’s got a MBA and used to fly a jet, neither of which are simple. Bush did extraordinarily well in the aftermath of 9/11. UBL is almost certainly dead. Bush has removed a vicious dictator from power whom almost everyone - including Kerry - were convinced had WMD. We part over the administration of Iraq since - we should have given Saddam a quick trial and then packed up and gone home - but Kerry offers nothing different. Economics? We hear critcism of the current administration but no concrete, budgetted alternative. We hear of a return to the Clinton era, which led to the dotcom bust and Enron. Is Kerry going to repeal the Patriot Act? And it goes on.