CANADIAN OBSERVATION OF THE USA ELECTION

[Guest KLARK KENTSKI]

 

 

 

This is worth reading! (Regardless of party affiliation)

 

Canadian Observation

 

Our Canadian neighbors up north have been observing the three ring

circus act known as the US presidential primaries. Divorced from

meaningless party loyalties and other hysteria, here's an editorial

that addresses ... brace yourself ... the qualifications / experience that

the democrats and some republicans offer. From Hillary's phantom 35

years to Obama's ZERO years of experience and achievements it's absurd

that these twits are leading contenders for the US Presidency. WHY

HASN'T THE U.S. MEDIA PUBLISHED ANYTHING SIMILAR?

 

Democrat or Republican? The question is shockingly easy!

Theo Caldwell, National Post ( Canada ) Wednesday, December 26, 2007

 

 

An obvious choice can be unnerving. When the apparent perfection of one

option or the unspeakable awfulness of another makes a decision seem

too easy, it is human nature to become suspicious.

 

This instinct intensifies as the stakes of the given choice are raised.

American voters know no greater responsibility to their country and to

the world than to select their president wisely. While we do not yet

know who the Democrat and Republican nominees will be, any combination

of the leading candidates from either party will make for the most

obvious choice put to American voters in a generation. To wit, none of

the Democrats has any business being president.

 

This pronouncement has less to do with any apparent perfection among

the Republican candidates than with the intellectual and experiential

paucity evinced by the Democratic field. "Not ready for prime time,"

goes the vernacular, but this does not suffice to describe how bad

things are.

Alongside Hillary Clinton, add Barack Obama's kindergarten essays to an

already confused conversation about Dennis Kucinich's UFO sightings,

dueling celebrity endorsements and who can be quickest to retreat from

America 's global conflict and raise taxes on the American people, and

it becomes clear that these are profoundly unserious individuals.

 

 

To be sure, there has been a fair amount of rubbish and rhubarb on the

Republican side (Ron Paul, call your office), but even a cursory review

of the legislative and professional records of the leading contenders

from each party reveals a disparity akin to adults competing with

children.

 

For the Republicans, Rudy Giuliani served as a two-term mayor of New

York City , turning a budget deficit into a surplus and taming what was

thought to be an ungovernable metropolis. Prior to that, he held the

third-highest rank in the Reagan Justice Department, obtaining over

4,000 convictions.

Mitt Romney, before serving as governor of Massachusetts , founded a

venture capital firm that created billions of dollars in shareholder

value, and he then went on to save the Salt Lake City Olympics. While

much is made of Mike Huckabee's history as a Baptist minister, he was

also a governor for more than a decade and, while Arkansas is hardly a

"cradle of presidents," it has launched at least one previous chief

executive to national office. John McCain's legislative and military

career spans five decades, with half that time having been spent in the

Congress. Even Fred Thompson, whose excess of nonchalance has

transformed his once-promising campaign into nothing more than a

theoretical possibility, has more experience in the U.S. Senate than

any of the leading Democratic candidates.

 

With just over one term as a Senator to her credit, Hillary Clinton

boasts the most extensive record of the potential Democratic nominees.

In that time, Senator Clinton cannot claim a single legislative

accomplishment of note, and she is best known lately for requesting

$1-million from Congress for a museum to commemorate Woodstock

 

Barack Obama is nearing the halfway point of his first term in the

Senate, having previously served as an Illinois state legislator and,

as Clinton has correctly pointed out, has done nothing but run for

president since he first arrived in Washington . Between calling for

the invasion of Pakistan and fumbling a simple question on driver's

licenses for illegal aliens, Obama has shown that he is not the fellow to whom

the nation ought to hike the nuclear football.

 

John Edwards, meanwhile, embodies the adage that the American people

will elect anyone to Congress -- once. From his $1,200 haircuts to his

personal war on poverty, proclaimed from the porch of his

28,000-square-foot home, purchased with the proceeds of preposterous

lawsuits exploiting infant cerebral palsy, Edwards is living proof that

history can play out as tragedy and farce simultaneously.

 

Forget for a moment all that you believe about public policy. Discard

your notions about taxes and Iraq , free trade and crime, and consider

solely the experience of these two sets of candidates. Is there any

serious issue that you would prefer to entrust to a person with the

Democrats' experience, rather than that of any of the Republicans?

 

Does this decision not become unsettlingly simple?