Politicians in general are not blameless, which includes democratic politicians, but republicans have been in control for a long while and have done nothing to better the situation. Republicans, in control at the time, led us into an unnecessary war on top of the world's main source of energy. Many democrats may have supported that, but I don't think Obama was one of those. I believe he was opposed to that course of action at that time. I believe in limited government and the free market, but what we have now is neither. Government is being abused to the benefit of the wealthy and many Republicans are unwilling to address that. The deep ravine between the wealthy and poor is a result of taking advantage of the imperfections of intricate regulations and the party who had their way for most of Bush's presidency allowed the poor to become poorer, which tears at the fabric of civilized society. I believe the measure of a society is the quality of life of its poor, and with Republicans at the helm the average working class American has seen a decline in quality of life. Bush has been around all 8 years, the top dog at that, and has been a beacon of partisanship. That you'll ignore that and blame the highest ranking democrat doesn't seem like a level argument. I'm not defending Pelosi or the Democratic party, but you sure do seem to be going out of your way to drink from the Republican punchbowl.
Musharraf isn't exactly allowing Pashtun tribes to give bin Laden safe refuge, it seems like it is really out of his control (which begs the question, why did we give Pakistan $10 billion?). This isn't really contradictory to your overall point that we are foolishly propping up an unpopular leader in a nation with a lot of anti-American sentiment. And propping up Musharraf just makes the anti-American sentiment worse. The Bush administration has allowed a number of shots at bin Laden post 9/11 to slip through their fingers. The biggest instance I can think of is not fully committing to bringing the perpetrator of 9/11 to justice and instead starting up a second front in an unrelated country which posed little to no threat to US national security. I'm sure I don't agree with everything Democrats have done, but that doesn't change the fact that while in control Republicans have reduced the quality of life of average Americans while the richest Americans have seen an increase in quality of life. Not like they were living too bad before.
To each his own, my moral beliefs are very important to me and I'll vote along those aligns ahead of any other issue.
To each his own . . . but I'll select a preacher based on my moral beliefs ahead of all other issues. I'll select a president based on his intelligence, competence, insight, perception, wisdom, aptitude, and prudence.
I imagine there are a lot of Democrats who want to be good stewards of the environment but also understand that tough decisions must be made, especially when the alternative is war. I believe you are focusing on a minority in the Democratic party, which is indicative of the party warfare that is common these days. Isn't it odd to focus on sins of sexuality? I imagine most heterosexuals lead sinful lives, and many heterosexuals are guilty of sins of sexuality. If two people love each other, sexuality aside, why should they not be allowed the basic civil rights that heterosexuals are allowed? Our immediate concern should be the well being of the US and a strong national defense. I truly believe China and Russia are a bigger threat to both, and Pakistan is probably a bigger threat than Iran (which I've heard is something of an outlier among Muslim nations). We are burying ourselves in debt and losing face on a national stage with emerging contenders and it seems our economic well-being and national defense are weaker than ever. All for a tangential war that has little to do with 9/11. In fact, the Republican party's commitment to punishing those responsible for 9/11 has been very suspect despite having control of the political landscape for much of Bush's presidency and despite increasing the executive's power.
Marriage is intended for the benefit of and the furtherance of the human race, ie raising a family and showing children how to raise a family.... A man and his wife receive benefits of marriage to order to accomplish this. Homosexuals have no reason for the benefit of marriage.
Is that the secular definition of marriage? I'm not sure we want an overall rate of reproduction much higher than unity. There are already a lot of people in the world, maybe too many.
This is nothing more than assumption on your part. You can't say for certain that the war in Iraq had any negative affect on capturing/killing bin Laden. This is nothing more than class warfare. If a rich guy has 10 mil dollars to invest and gets a very moderate return of 5% his income from that investment would be 500 thousand dollars. Of course the gap between the rich and poor is going to increase as it did during the Clinton years. Explain to me a circumstance where the poor guy could make up ground with the rich guy. A full blown depression? http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2007/dec/14/PFA_incomegap/
Its a little difficult for the media to see anything other than their own feet right now...that's all that's in view as they bend over for Obama.
