Many of you out there may be confused about where Bush and Kerry stand on certain issues, and with the Presidential election less than 100 days away, it would be nice to have it explained to you. Now you can watch the DNC and RNC on television and listen to all the hot air that politicians tend to blow and be equally confused after the conventions are over, or you can keep reading. The choice is yours.There are a number of key topics that I feel need addressing. I will address these topics, in terms of where each candidate stands, and give a brief explanation as to what consequences (good or bad) their stance will have for the country.
The first topic is abortion. Simply put, Bush is against it, and Kerry is for it (except that he’s also against it, go figure). More specifically, Bush signed the Partial Birth Abortion Act, which outlawed Partial Birth Abortions. He does however support few exceptions, where abortions should be allowed. He feels that abortion should be legal in cases where the mother is put in a life or death situation, incest and rape. Kerry on the other hand believes that the Constitution protects a woman’s right to choose, and has said that if elected as President he would appoint pro-Abortion judges to fill Supreme Court vacancies. Basically what this means is that Bush’s stance protects the lives of unborn children, where Kerry’s stance protects a mother’s right to kill her child as it is, in his mind a protected Constitutional right. Unfortunately after searching through the US Constitution, I could not find the word abortion, or the phrase “right to privacy” anywhere. The only phrase pertaining to “privacy” was the term “private property” found in the 5th Amendment, and the last time I checked the 13th Amendment abolished slavery, so a person can no longer be private property. Sorry Johnny boy, you lose on this issue.
The next issue of importance is the economy. According to Bush over 1 million jobs were created during his Presidency, and according to Kerry, there were 3 million lost. Who should you believe? Well hopefully there are some facts backing up these statistics, and they’re not just throwing out numbers. According to an interview of an economist on the Fox News Channel, there are two sets of data that are compiled to arrive at unemployment numbers. The first, and the one that Kerry cites, determines the number of employed individuals through weekly payroll tax receipts. The second, more accurate method, which Bush cites includes everyone who is employed, even if they don’t pay weekly payroll tax, and more importantly does not include those who are not seeking jobs. People included in the second set of employment data, and excluded from the first would be self employed individuals who pay quarterly tax on their income, not weekly (note, there are more sole proprietorships in America than Corporations), seasonal employees, such as those who work jobs in the summer but not in the winter and some consultants just to name a few. Now does it really seem fair to say that these people should be included in the “unemployed” column of Kerry’s stats? I don’t think so, again things aren’t looking good in “Kerry’s Ketchup Korner” (or KKK for short).
On the issue of War on Terror and Homeland Security, Bush led our troops into Afghanistan and Iraq, and in a short period of time toppled the anti-American regimes. Kerry voted for the War in Iraq, only to later vote against spending to adequately supply our troops overseas. Bush signed a bill, creating the Department of Homeland Security, which protects our ports and borders from terrorists entering the country. Kerry on the other hand claims he will devote resources to volunteer manpower in the event of another attack. Sorry Johnny, I don’t think I need to go any further. Bush creates a department to prevent future attacks, while you will fund volunteers to respond to future attacks.
Finally, I’ll discuss the candidate’s stance on taxes. Bush signed into law various tax cuts, which among other things reduced the lowest tax bracket from 15% to 10% (a 33% tax decrease on low income taxpayers), reduced the middle 31% and 28% brackets to 25% and the highest 39.6% and 36% brackets were reduced to 33%. Kerry wishes to increase taxes on companies who use foreign labor (even if they end up creating new American jobs in the process), and will give tax breaks to companies who do not use foreign labor. This will encourage the retention of American jobs, but will discourage the creation of new jobs. High American labor costs force companies to hire fewer Americans than they would be able to if they used foreign labor for unskilled labor, and Americans for the skilled work. Kerry also reported that he will keep the middle-class tax cuts but will repeal some of the tax cuts on high income taxpayers, despite the fact that the top 5% of tax payers pay over 50% of the tax.
Sorry Kerry it would take a “Flip Flop” of unprecedented proportions to make you look like a good candidate for the Presidency. I just don’t think you’ve got what it takes to follow in Bush’s footsteps.
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