good editorial on the rationale for voting Obama

[jackulator]

my aunt sent this to me a little while ago - I don't agree with all of it, but it's pretty fair and balanced - good read:

After eight years of George W. Bush, America needs a change in direction and a change in tone.

It needs a president who understands that, yes, the world can be dangerous, but it is also complex. That the United States cannot defend its freedom by abandoning its principles. That it cannot ignore its allies one day and demand their help the next.

It needs a president who knows that optimism, not fear, defines America. That tax cuts and deregulation alone are not an economic strategy. That Washington cannot sit idle when a great city is devastated by nature or when millions of hardworking Americans are devastated by losing their homes, their jobs, their health care.

It needs a president who will listen and learn, and not confuse loyalty with competence. Who will ask Americans to sacrifice in the service of their country, not their party or self-interest. Who will be the leader Bush promised eight years ago -- a unifier, not a divider.

Barack Obama can be that leader.

He is young and obviously cannot match the government experience of his Republican opponent, John McCain. But from the moment he electrified the 2004 Democratic Convention by declaring that America's shared values must trump its racial, religious and ideological divisions, Obama has demonstrated uncommon grace, confidence and intelligence.

Obama has challenged Americans to dream and to hope, to be realistic in the face of great problems and to trust in one another. To minorities and other Americans on the margins, he offers living proof that this nation can fulfill its ideals. To the world, he offers quite literally a different face, one that embodies America's diversity and boundless opportunity.

That is a recipe for the fresh leadership this nation desperately needs. And it is why we urge his election as the 44th president of the United States.

Like you, we have watched this presidential campaign unfold for almost two full years. We have listened to the candidates, read their position papers, studied their backgrounds. We have watched them debate. We have seen them react when things were going well and when they were not. We have seen them choose running mates who could be asked to lead this nation on a moment's notice.

We find much to admire about both Obama and McCain. Obama's background is an only-in-America amalgam of Kansas and Kenya, Hawaii and Indonesia, Harvard Yard and Hyde Park. McCain is every bit as much a biographer's dream: a son and grandson of admirals who embraced their tradition of service, then forged his own through war, the Hanoi Hilton and 26 years in Congress. Traveling very different paths, each man has come to know and to benefit from the best of this country.

Having endorsed McCain and Obama in their respective party primaries, we have little doubt that either could serve capably as president. Certainly, either would be a huge improvement over the incumbent.

We also believe that either would govern more effectively and lead more inclusively than they have campaigned these last two months. They had better, because this fall has degenerated into a disappointing cacophony of attack ads and banality.

McCain has shamelessly exaggerated Obama's supposedly radical ties and tried to place him far outside the political mainstream. Obama has twisted McCain's record beyond recognition and attempted to tie him to Republican ideologues he has fought his whole career.

Such campaigning insults the American people and degrades those who engage in it. Voters who hunger for straight talk about the most frightening economy in 70 years, or who long for hope in the face of two grinding wars, deserve better.

We endorse Obama, knowing full well that doing so involves some risk.

If he is elected on Nov. 4, he will govern with a Congress dominated by fellow Democrats. That should help him fulfill his promises to reform health care, invest in green energy and raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans. But if a President Obama believes he can simply impose his will -- or even worse, must buckle to the will of doctrinaire congressional barons -- he may fall prey to the one-party hubris that so damaged both the Bush presidency and the GOP brand. Obama will have to be tough enough to push back if Democrats on Capitol Hill try to draw him into the mindless partisanship he has often and rightly renounced. Polarization is a bad way to campaign; it's a worse way to govern.

Those who have known Obama the longest say he instinctively seeks win-win solutions and understands that there usually is more than one way to reach a worthy goal. Let's hope so. He has an ambitious agenda, but will inherit a federal deficit approaching $1 trillion, as well as long-term financial obligations that could cripple future generations. He'll have to make harder choices than he has been willing to acknowledge in this campaign.

If they had not become bitter rivals, Obama might have found a useful ally and role model in McCain, who has spent a lifetime marching to the beat of a different drum. In the Senate, McCain has challenged his party on immigration, taxes and torture, campaign finance and pork-barrel spending. He supported Bush's ill-informed decision to invade Iraq, then quickly became a loud critic of the president's equally flawed strategy to win the peace.

We salute McCain as an exemplary citizen and a Washington rebel. But as a presidential nominee, McCain has been a disappointment. He was late to understand the primacy of economic pain. He has failed even to define a rationale for a McCain presidency. Experience is useful, but it's not vision.

In their first debate, McCain haughtily said that Obama did not understand the difference between strategy and tactics. His campaign suggests that he doesn't, either.

Take his selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. McCain seemed too caught up in the game-changing possibilities of teaming with a woman reformer to scratch the smiling surface. Had he, McCain might have realized that Palin is utterly unprepared for the job he offered -- let alone the one that might fall to her. His trust in her undermines our trust in him.

Trust is essential to the presidency. Americans want to believe that the chief executive understands their lives, will protect their interests and will not compromise their safety. They want a president who represents what America can be, not what it has been.

Electing any president involves a leap of faith -- a risk. Such is the power of the office.

For a country in need of a new direction and a new tone, Barack Obama is a risk worth taking.

I think it's by someone named Alex Brandon with the Associated Press