boyradd

Supporting the Government 4: The Democratic Hopefuls

The past few weeks I have looked at the Republican candidates, probably angering not just conservative political supporters, but also angering much of the religious political groupies.

This past week I was at the Southern Baptist SEND conference. It was amazing and we had a surprise, at one point we saw an interview with Marco Rubio and then after that video interview, Jeb Bush walked out on the stage and spoke for about 20 minutes. Even after listening to him speak, I am still not going to change my view of him, I still believe he is a liar.

But I am not here to discuss Republicans anymore. I want to discuss the top Democratic contenders this week. Pretty much whenever someone thinks of a religious fanatic like myself, they think that being Democrat is a sin. And to most evangelical Christians, being Democrat is putting a scarlet D on your chest.

The first is Lincoln Chafee, former U.S. Senator and Governor from Rhode Island. Chafee served as a GOP Senator until he became disenfranchised with the system and turned independent. Even though he has declared as a Democratic Presidential candidate, he really tends to be more moderate and has earned a reputation of being a fence-sitter on various issues.

Unfortunately, on many of the issues which I, as a Christian, hold dear, we will find that not only he, but most likely all the candidates will differ significantly, some of which will nullify my vote for them. But one thing they do have going for them, on most of the major issues that I disagree with them on, they are not lying, like many of the GOP candidates have.

With Chafee, he believes completely in a woman’s right to personal reproductive decisions. I do agree with his immigration standpoint, which is legalization and guest worker programs. He supports gay rights. But one thing surprised me. He supports allowing churches to provide welfare services. I would think, and I would hope, that this means that he supports keeping the sanctity of the church as equal to those of other non-profits. Overall, he received 50% by the Gospel Coalition for being mixed on his voting record.

Overall, I would withhold my vote from him, but only because of his personal views on the issues above, not because he is a liar.

Martin O’Malley, Former Governor of Maryland

I know of O’Malley because of living in Maryland for almost all his political career. While I am impressed that he took a huge political swing at both Obama and Hilary by saying that “we must save our country now.” O’Malley has a history of making big promises as Governor but not following through. For example, he promised to reclaim the city’s abandoned buildings but between 2002-2007 the number abandoned buildings actually increased by over 2,500. Just after his exit from office, Baltimore was ranked as the least likely to allow children to escape poverty in a Harvard survey of 100 of the largest cities in America. He also raised taxes significantly during his time in office, taking the top personal tax rate to 5.75% (up 1%), increased corporate taxes by 1.25% to 8.25%, increased the sales tax from 5 to 6% and almost doubled the gas tax, increasing it from 23.5 cents to 43.5 cents. All of this increased taxation led to an exodus of 31,000 residents from the state while he was Governor.

Even if it weren’t for the issues that I am analyzing candidates for in this blog, I would not be able to vote for O’Malley. He simply does not have a strong financial record and has actually hurt the most impoverished throughout the state. But as for the issues, O’Malley has come out in support of abortion funding. He did say, however, that abortion should be “safe, legal, and rare.”

Mr. O’Malley, what do you mean? That is about as clear as a black piece of paper.

So, sorry Martin, I cannot support your campaign and will not be voting for you.

Jim Webb – former Senator from Virginia

Webb started out as a Republican and served as Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration. Most recently, though, he was a Democratic Senator from Virginia. He left operational politics in 2013, citing that he could not stand partisan politics that happened in Washington. As for the issues, he is blatantly pro-abortion, even going so far as to believe that the unborn deserve no rights. With civil rights, he has some strange beliefs. He believes that racism can end if the “right leader found a way to bring Scots-Irish and African Americans to the same table.” Ooooooook? That makes little sense to me, but I would give him a shot and see what happens with that. With same-sex marriage, he is a little schizophrenic. He support the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell rule that was done away with, but he supports same-sex marriage to non-military.

Sorry, Mr. Webb, I cannot vote for you. Not only are you schizophrenic, and a little out there, you oppose that which I feel is important to not oppose.

Joe Biden – Vice President of the United States

Vice President Biden has not officially declared, but was urged by his dying son to run for the Presidency in 2016. A strange twist is that there is a rumor that he would ask President Obama to be his running mate. Well if THAT isn’t enough to stop me from voting for him, there is quite a bit more that I can provide to show that he is not worthy of my vote. One of the major things deals with abortion. I can honestly call Biden a liar. He says that he accepts that life begins at conception, but that abortion needs to be allowed by the government. This is a blatant view that goes against what he says. Either he doesn’t truly believe life begins at conception, which means he lied, or he is too weak of a person to truly stand up for what he believes to the be the right choice.

Vice President Biden, I am sorry, I cannot cast my vote for a liar if you choose to run. I must say, however, that Biden would be the most logical choice for President from the Democratic party, especially if he can get Obama as a running mate.

Bernie Sanders – Junior Senator from Vermont

Sanders calls himself a “Democratic Socialist” and typically runs Independent but chooses the Democratic party because of their support of his views. I must admit that there are some views of his that I totally agree with. For example, I agree with his views on up to 14 weeks of paid time off for new parents. I also agree with his view of mandatory sick leave of 7 days for all employees. But in the grand scheme of things, I cannot agree with him on several key issues, such as when life in the womb should be protected. In 2009, he supported abortion for population control purposes. He also refuses to define the life in the womb as a child. He also voted against protecting the sanctity of marriage as one man one woman. To go along with that, he voted against protecting the Pledge of Allegiance. He is also considerably for removing God from the public. For example, he is for allowing public funding of responsible fatherhood programs, but voted no on the bill because it included faith-based organizations that would be eligible for funding.

Sorry, Bernie, I cannot vote for you. While I do like some of your ideas around the corporate world, I cannot honestly change how I feel about hot topic issues and my Christianity.

Hilary Clinton – Former Secretary of State

Hillary started her career of lying by explaining where she got her name. She explained that she got it from the first man to ever climb Mt. Everest, Sir Edmund Hillary, but unfortunately, he wasn’t known until 6 years after her birth. She is clearly pro-choice as is evidenced by the significant number of quotes and stances on pro-choice. She also, not surprisingly, is for gay marriage and redefinition of marriage. But her big issue lately is the Benghazi scandal. The basics of the story is that Clinton used her personal email to discuss incidences related to Benghazi in 2012. Now she is claiming that she is unable to produce the records of what was really said. She has gone so far to say that no subpoena of her records was ever issued, but that was later proven false. A lot more will come out of this in the days leading up to, and even after the election. And I would suspect, that just like many of the GOP and Democratic candidates, she will prove to be even more of a liar than she already is.

Sorry, Hillary, you need to be able to speak the truth at all times if you even expect me to consider voting for you. But the fact that you have the stance you do on abortion and gay marriage means you will never earn my vote.

So there you have it. As of now, the closest I can vote is GOP. Unfortunately, both parties have drawn their lines in the sand on various issues and neither party is acceptable in my eyes.

Next week I will finish this series with what I would proclaim if I ran for President of the United States.