Jeff Taylor

John McCain has some great ideas, with his willingness to remove much of the excess from government. I like many of his ideas, though I seriously disagree with where he stands on the wars in Iraq and Afganistan. That being said, it’s not what is driving my vote away from McCain…

I like Barack Obama’s maturity throughout his campaign. I see many of the attacks from McCain to Obama, including taking so many of Obama’s statements out of context. What’s worse, in my opinion, is the fact that McCain will not look at or hold a personal conversation with Obama. If he is not capable of doing so, then how can he effectively lead this country. This is a scenario that he would have to deal with from the Oval Office.

Haven’t we dealt with one person who has been too stubborn for the last eight years? In the most powerful office in the world, there is a time to be flexible and a time to be rigid. That person should never be both all of the time, yet it appears McCain is demonstrating a lack of flexibility…. already….

Is the death penalty inhumane? Well, most likely. Is the reason that a criminal is getting the death penalty due to an inhumane act that they perpetrated on another human being?

Is the death penalty cruel and unusual punishment? Why would it be? Really, why shouldn’t it be? What makes it different from justice? Justice dictates that the punishment must fit the crime, in accordance with the will of society. If the community feels that capital punishment is warranted in certain circumstances, then it is the will of the people to make the law.

Now I realize that we wait such a long time for the appeals process before we execute them in order to prove innocence, but if we know that someone is straight-out guilty, why provide that service at the expense of tax payers? We pay for some of these people to live, when they have deprived someone else of life!

It’s time for someone to introduce a plan to execute those who are proven to be guilty, withou a doubt. At least the condemned get better treatment than the victims. Perhaps that should be reconsidered as well.

Look, if you are an American citizen, and you don’t know about the national debt you should be ashamed. Just as we rack up the credit on the credit cards, we make our payments to avoid fees and legal issues, right?

Right?

What if your debt was a 9 followed by twelve zeroes? Huh? OK, look at it this way – $9,000,000,000,000.

This is the fiscal irresponsibility of the United States government. It is helping to drag down the value of the dollar, which helps to fuel inflation (oil and food prices). The budget was balanced under President Bill Clinton, but was destroyed by George W. Bush.

If our budget does not get balanced, and our debts get paid, our children will be crushed. Crushed by inflation, by debt, by national bankruptcy. Visit http://www.concordcoalition.org/ for more information. If you really care – and you should – you might consider getting in touch with your representatives and ask them to make this one of their priorities.

What’s the scoop with so many students in so many schools these days? There is a huge respect problem in the school system, mainly because the schools have become too lax, and also because they are being forced to retain students that would rather not be there (the No Child Left Behind act).

 An example is the Baltimore Lewis HS teacher who was attacked by a student. A teacher tells a student to back out of her personal space. The student threatens the teacher, and the teacher states that she will defend herself. The student starts in on the teacher.

The lack of respect is appauling, and is being bread by laws that prevent proper discipline, and is endorsed by schools, such as the one mentioned, who refuse to properly back their faculty in a confrontation. People keep asking what is happening to our country, look here…

The time is near where we will elect a new president, hopefully one that will listen to the people, rather than follow his own, sole agenda. The question then becomes what is important, and right now that is changing quickly. Inflation is causing our priorities to migrate rapidly, so what was important 6 months ago isn’t as much now.

The economy, while in a slump now, will get better, so will we regret not focusing on other issues when our next president is elected. Currently some of the biggest topics to most people are:

• The Economy
• The Iraq War
• Health Insurance
• Energy Independance
• The Environment
• Government Spending and Waste
• Immigration
• Liberty vs Security

These are just some of the issues, but our candidates need to have a planto deal with these.

In many cases Bush has put us into a situation of a need for repair, at home and globally. The person we choose to lead us and represent us must be able to undo what has been done and put us back on track to resolve our debts and make us self-sufficient, as well as improve our status with our allies and the world.

Is it possible that oil could hit $200 a barrel? Hugo Chavez said it is, if the U.S. attacks Venezuela or Iran.

1st - I know Bush has a big mouth, himself, but when has the U.S. government talked about going to war with Venezuela? If Bush had a third term, who knows who we would go to war with, but obviously it won’t happen. If anything our next president is more likely to engage in talks with Iran. Talks with Venezuela’s Chavez – doubtful.

2nd – Why hasn’t our government done something to promote less reliance on the likes of such an arrogant dictator, who is no better than Russia. Given enough time, he will demonstrate his power over his oil supplies, just as Putin did with the natural gas supplies. These men like their power, and power corrupts.

This is where idiots  like Chavez know where to hit us. The problem is, we continue to put up with it, and we continue to buy from Hugo. Doesn’t that make us the idiots? We are, afterall, letting this wannabe threaten us.

It is because of threats like this that we NEED to become energy independant. Chavez is of the paranoid personality that will turn the oil revenue (that we pay him) to use it against us.

This problem isn’t going to go away. Keep in mind when you buy a new car, home or appliance. Consider conservation, or fuels supplied at home.

Maybe it’s because I’m from a small town, but I guess I don’t see the issue. It seems we have a few people that want to make more of it than what it is, and many jumping on just for the cause.

If you want to declare crimes of hate as those where it’s one race against another, rather than based on a personality clash, than there are many cases where there are victims on all sides. Since our friend, Al Sharpton, wants to define Jena as an example, you have the case where it was wrong for kids to intimidate others with nooses, and even more wrong when the ones who felt intimidated took their anger out by putting a fellow student in the hospital. In either case, it’s wrong.

Like I said, I live in a small town and in an old house. I can tell you that when you work to clean something this old, there will always be dirt remaining, if you look for it.