Whine Wealthy, Whine!

The income of the three major presidential candidates is astonishing: a household income of $4.2 million dollars for the Obama family; a jointed $109 million dollar income for the Clinton family; a $406 thousand dollars for John McCain, not including his wife, who files her income separately because of an inherited brewery (worth over $1 million!). New York Times wrote an article about this which I found appealing to my opinions.
What if you didn’t have any of your own money to campaign to our country? Yes, selling books apparently works, my democratic friends. But still, how do you even put your foot in the door with no money? There could be some answers tomorrow, Tuesday April 22, 2008, during a “legal challenge” to the Supreme Court. When a member of the House spends more than $305, 000 of their own money on campaigning, they are entitled to Section 319 of the McCain-Feingold law of 1971:

U.S.C. 441e) is amended—

(1) By striking the heading and inserting the following:

`CONTRIBUTIONS AND DONATIONS BY FOREIGN NATIONALS'; and

(2) By striking subsection (a) and inserting the following:
` (a) PROHIBITION- It shall be unlawful for--
` (1) a foreign national, directly or indirectly, to make--
` (A) a donation of money or other thing of value, or to
Promise expressly or impliedly to make a donation, in
Connection with a Federal, State, or local election to a
Political committee or a candidate for Federal office; or
` (ii) a contribution or donation to a committee of a
Political party; or
` (B) For a person to solicit, accept, or receive such
Contribution or donation from a foreign national.’

A prior candidate for Congress, Jack Davis, from New York in 2006, is appealing this amendment claiming his opponent had three times the amount of contributions that he had, just because he didn’t have enough money himself. He felt that this would push the wealthy away from running and is a violation of the 1st Amendment. Even though people like Davis thought this, more candidates actually spent more than $1 million of their own money on campaigns. He also feels uncomfortable having to report the expected amount of money that will be spent on a campaign; isn’t it is all a zero-sum game Mr. Davis?
In concurrence with the article I read, “[wealthy candidates] certainly don’t need any extra help.” Stop whining!

Not McCain

In response to Christopher's Awesome Blog:

I agree that John McCain is a heavy leaning republican and likes to take whatever he can get. I don’t, though, like the man for many reasons and I am not even going to touch the subject of his POW issues.
In an article titled “Conservatives, don’t ignore McCain”, the author makes sure McCain is seen as a conservative by talking about some of the ridiculous things he has said or done.

McCain's been a consistent pro-lifer (which distinguishes him from pretty much everyone else in the race so far). Until recently, Giuliani argued passionately for partial-birth abortion as a constitutional right. McCain has voted to confirm every conservative Supreme Court nominee, including Robert Bork. He voted "guilty" in Bill Clinton's impeachment trial. He campaigned for George W. Bush in 2000 and 2004,even after Bush beat him.

Giuliani's chief selling point seems to be that he'll have "what it takes" to be tough in the war on terror. That may well be the case. But Giuliani's foreign policy experience is, at best, limited. Meanwhile, McCain's experience is deeper than the rest of the field's combined. There's no evidence that Giuliani is more of a hawk than McCain, who has spent the last four years arguing that Bush needs to be more aggressive in Iraq and who argued for a troop "surge" years before anyone used the word.

After 9/11, Giuliani earned his reputation for showing his sensitive side. After 9/11, McCain said to our enemies, "May God have mercy on you, because we won't."

John McCain’s campaign page, talks about where he stands on many issues.

“A greater military commitment now is necessary if we are to achieve long-term success in Iraq. John McCain agrees with retired Army General Jack Keane that there are simply not enough American forces in Iraq”.

I don’t know if you have any friends in Iraq? I do. I would rather him come home soon than be there for the rest of his career; his child’s lifetime and possibly their children’s lives will still be fighting to help “democratize” the Iraqis.

McCain says:

"Increasing U.S. troop levels will expose more brave Americans to danger and increase the number of American casualties. When Congress authorized this war, we committed America to a mission that entails the greatest sacrifice a country can make, one that falls disproportionately on those Americans who love their country so much that they volunteer to risk their lives to accomplish that mission. And when we authorized this war, we accepted the responsibility to make sure those men and women could prevail. Extending combat tours and accelerating the deployment of additional troops is a terrible sacrifice to impose on the best patriots among us, and they will understandably be disappointed when they are given that order. Then they will shoulder their weapons and do everything they can to protect our country's vital interests in Iraq."

He also wants to overturn a supreme court ruled constitutional consequence of Roe vs. Wade… lets just pretend like that never happened? Just ignore that the people voted on that and embedded in the constitution? I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound cool to me?
I found it funny that since 2003 McCain has repeatedly said we need more troops. He talks about this on his website to show his stability on the situation, but to me it made him look stubborn more than anything. You would think after trying the same thing over and over, one would think of another approach to deal with a problem.

August 2003: "We must win this conflict. We need a lot more military, and I'm convinced we need to spend a lot more money."
November 2003: "To win in Iraq, we should increase the number of forces in-country, including Marines and Special Forces, to conduct offensive operations”.
"We need more troops.... [W]e have to be much more robust and do and send whatever troops are necessary."
April 2004: We should increase the number of forces, including Marines and Special Forces, to conduct offensive operations. There is also a dire need for other types of forces
September 2004:"I think that we need more troops in Iraq. I've thought that for a long time, election or no election
June2005: "I think we need - I think we need more troops there ... because we're not staying once we attack and clear. We've got stay and expand."
June 2006: "You know, I've always said that we needed more troops over there. I have said that for years."
January 2007: "We will need a large number of troops."

I just feel we need to be a blue country for many reasons, this being one of the last. McCain will not change anything and the war and negativitey will continue for sure. There is a chance with either Democratic candidtates that there will be a change.