Centerfield

Thanks for the link. Looks like NEXT has a diverse group of views.

As for the article you quote from, I'd like to make short comments on two points:

1)One assertion that he makes is that it is better to vote for Bush -- warts, screw-ups and all -- because there is (theoretically) a higher degree of certainty about what kind of a president Bush would be over the next four years than what kind of a president Kerry would be.

Mathew, I've seen you say much the same thing. I understand that it's rhetorical purpose is to persuade, but I can't figure out the logic to this. Can someone put this argument in something closer to a syllogism with assumptions expicitly stated? (I know...that will take work.)

2) Social Security: this program is more than simply a personal savings program. I'm not against encouraging personal savings, but that does not address another aspect: social insurance, especially in scenarios of steep economic downturn. Should these features be kept, eliminated, or what?

Also, as a person in my latter 50's, I realize that I may have to delay retirement and have benefits tailored more to my need in order to make the system more secure for the many in greater need. And I also recognize that neither party nor candidate is really being upfront with the voters on this issue.

Erasmus,

I really don't see what your problem is with the comfort level many have with Bush, or why you seem to pass it off as rhetoric. I think Bush is more direct, period. When he ran for Presiden the last time around the man made several promises. He said he was going to spend more on education than Clinton did and tie Federal funding to results, and he supported a bill that passed with bi-partisan support that did just that. He said he was going to support a prescription drug benefit, he did, it passed. He said he was going cut taxes, he did. He said he was pro-life, but that he wasn't going to propsoe making abortion illegal, and he hasn't. He said he was going to increase defense spending, and he did. He said he would defend the definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman, he has. In fact, besides the faith based initiative and social security reform there isn't much that Bush ran on in 2000 that has yet to come true. Is Bush more conservative than I thought he would govern? Sure he is, but like him or not you cannot say he did not do what he said he was going to, and I have no reason to believe that will be the case for his second term.

If you don't like what Bush has done, or what he is proposing, it is not going to be enough for you that he is honest.... Great... Good for you... Vote for Kerry. I, on the other hand, think the doom and gloom rhetoric, mostly coming from extreme fringe types like Michael Moore and Howard Dean, is just that: rhetoric. I don't think the country is threatened by his policies, I don't the direction he has led us in is awful, and I think I am going to get in the second term what I got in the first... A President who is more conservative than I am, but on the war on terror and economics we for the most part agreee. Furthermore, I don't see where anyone is offering me any evidence to lead me to believe anything to the contrary.

Now let's talk about Kerry. The man has a record. For twenty years in the United States Senate he has consistenly been one of the most liberal members of his party, but he doesn't talk about that. One minute he is a New Demoocrat and the next he is an anti-war liberal. First he supports a war, and then he doesn't, and seems to have no explanation as to why. He votes against war funding, but accuses the administration of funding the war on the cheap, and explains it by saying the situation is complicated. He is inconsistent, and vague on many of his proposals, and in large part has run a safe campaign on soft issues that nobody can disagree with.

If I thought for a second that Kerry was going to govern as a centrist I would truthfully give him consideration, after all I like the man. I said in the primaries over an over that he or Joe Lieberman deserved the nomination. I thought the campaign he ran in Iowa was honorable, truthful, and positive, but then he won and started running as a front runner. Since that time the man has danced around his record, around the war, around the fact that he is proposing large spending increases in many areas and then out of the other side of his mouth he tells us he is going to reduce the deficit. I get the distinct impression that Kerry would do anything to be President of the United States. I don't fully trust that he would govern anywhere but to the left. I don't know what kind of President he would be, and given his record, who he is, and where he comes from, I simply believe that the country will be closer to the center under George W. Bush.

As far as Social Security goes, I don't understand your question. The same proposal that the Social Security Commission and the Bush administration has proposed for five years is one that would give people the right to invest in private accounts if they so choose, and allow those who don't to stay in the current system. I do think both party's dance around this issue; however, this system is failing and is largely on track to go bankrupt. The only candidate who is supporting anything other than the status quo is George W. Bush.

I'm not using the term rhetoric in a pejorative sense. But rhetoric includes more than an appeal to logic. I was wondering if you had thought things through in strictly logical terms and could put that into words. Ok. Never mind.

I do have to note that you're being rather selective about promises made and kept. I'm sure you've seen at least one of the lists of Bush 'flip-flops' that have been compiled. Why do you ignore each of those?

For Kerry you are content to characterize his positions in a way that you can easily dismiss with the assumption that no better case can be made -- and if it is to be made, that's not you're job. You're not on that team.

You start with the conclusion and back into supporting arguments from there. This may be offered as an effort to 'balance' what comes from the opposing camp via the same process, but it's not really very useful for establishing a conversation on the way to a consensus. We're not gonna get to a consensus this way. (This is not aimed mainly at you; it's the politically accepted way of advocacy: destroy the enemy...uh, I mean the opponent.)

So maybe I should forget trying to have an exchange of ideas and simply become equally as much an advocate for my guy. There are only two colors: blue and red.

I think it's a waste, but I'm sure you've picked up on that!