- Do you feel our current level of military spending is appropriate? Would you work to reduce spending in this area so we can invest in other ways?
- Do you consider waterboarding torture? Will you call it torture and demand that this tactic and other forms of torture be completely prohibited?
- Will you close Guantanamo, or will you at least guarantee that the Red Cross will have full access to ensure the Geneva Conventions are being honored there?
- Will you deal with illegal immigration in a way that supports human rights and our economy? Do you admit that our society benefits from immigrants, both legal and illegal? Would you attempt to send illegal immigrants home, or would you design a legal framework for dealing with these millions of people that would allow them to stay with their families and their jobs? Why did you or did you not support the reforms President Bush attempted to inact?
- How familiar are you with the Millenium Development Goals? Are you willing to honor our repeated commitment of offering .7% of GDP toward reaching these goals? Would you advocate for these objectives and lead us from .15% of GDP to at least .5%?
- Do you believe that military intervention is the best way to deal with countries such as Iran or North Korea? What other means of promoting peace and reconciliation do you advocate?
- Of course you must support business and the economy, but how much money have you received from lobbyists and special interests, specifically the defense (offense) industry, sickcare providers, and the industrial farming sector such as Monsanto? Who owns you?
- Are you satisfied with our current healthcare system where some 47 million people do not have health insurance? How would you work to improve this?
- How familiar are you with environmental issues? Who would be your advisor in this area? What is your stance on ecological conservation?
- Do you plan to continue funding for HIV/AIDS research and care such as President Bush has done?
- Who would you most want to have in your cabinet, especially in the posts of Attorney General, Secretary of Defense, and Secretary of State? Also leaders of the Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, the Environmental Protection Agency?
- What are your opinions of the Patriot Act and subsequent rulings and enactments?
- Do you believe unilateral or multilateral actions tend to be more effective at making a better world? In which situations?
- How would you support investments in clean and renewable energy? Politicians tend to focus on short-term issues, but we need forward-thinking leadership. How can we begin preparing for Peak Oil by moving toward more sustainable ways of life now? What role would your administration play in this area?
- What is your stance on sanctity of life issues--war, abortion, stem-cell research, poverty, etc.? Are you consistently pro-life? If not, explain your perspective on each issue.
What other questions would you want to ask?
God bless the whole world.
11 comments:
Even if you got a chance to ask them, the problem is that they probably have lovely answers already. It's what they do when they get elected that is still to be decided!
It must be fun living somewhere where the outcome of the elections is somewhat a suprise! Can I ask... in your opinion what do people think about voting? I mean do they make sure that they use the priveledge of having a voice in their country? Here almost nobody I know bothers to vote, and I find it rather upsetting that nobody seems to care at all. People died to obtain the right to vote, and now those of us who've always been allowed to, ignore it completely...
(sorry, mini-rant)
excuse the spelling, I've been away from civilisation for too long!
Other people said:
"I'm right with you on most of your presidential candidate questions. One of the reasons that I like Barack Obama is that he HAS addressed most of those issues at one time or another, and that my views align so well with his on the things that matter.
Specifically, MySpace posted video a few months ago where he answered 20 very important questions from a live audience."
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those are exactly the questions i would ask, too. yet, how often do you hear any of these questions asked at the debates? not very often.
specifically "who will be in your administration?"--this has caused us the most problems with the bush administration...people that we did NOT vote into office, but who run the country (have you seen frontline's "cheney's law"?? check it out on frontline's website for free).
also, i think "who owns you" is KEY to really getting to the heart of any candidacy and subsequent administration. i, for one, am SO tired of this country being run by big corporations & their special interests, defense contractors (which have made ENOURMOUS profits from these wars and who do NOT want us to be in a time of peace), drug companies, agri-business, insurance companies, oil companies, and not the PEOPLE. like wendy said in her blog recently, "We forget sometimes that they in the government work for us, not the other way around."
(npr did an interesting article on healthcare and their campaigns...interestingly, most of the gop wouldn't comment on their personal insurance coverage or coverage for their staff: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18033917)
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Good questions which, regardless of your own political leaning, would help anyone pick a candidate wisely, if they were all answered directly.
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Jeff that was well thought out and I like the energetic if not aggressive delivery of the questions. Thank you for taking the time to blog and propose ideas! I'm glad to see that you are using your time still to improve our world. When are you two coming to stay - I have room. Love to you both
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I might consider myself a republican, but not sure for how much longer. All those talk radio guys are disgusting! I think I'll vote based on illegal immigration reform. We are a richer country for having them, illegal or legal.
Another conversation...
H: i liked your questions for the president ... it's convenient that almost every question implies what your opinion is, thus giving them an opportunity to tell you what you want to hear. :) the only belief implied by one of your questions that i strongly disagree with is the pro-life one. i'm pro-choice for national safety/health reasons and i would highly recommend you go to www.guttmacher.org to browse a few articles and statistcs. :) peace.
ME: Hey, thanks for writing. You're right, I tipped my hand in most questions. I did want readers to know my leanings. Comments like "a ridiculous option" were a little more than mere leanings, I guess it could be argued. :)
As for question 15--yes, tricky. My first objective was to expand the concept of "sanctity of life." Usually, people refer only to abortion with this term, so I wanted to point out that war, poverty and even the environment involve the sanctity of life.
The end of that question leaves open debate on each issue because I know they are tricky, especially abortion since it is as much emotional as political, sociological or moral. I've had passionate conversations with friends on both sides of the issue, both sides finding the other unimaginable. "If it's wrong one minute after birth, then it's wrong one minute, one hour, one month, etc. before birth." "It's the woman's body, and no one should decide her child-bearing rights except her." "Once we have it banned, it will be as obviously evil as slavery." "Do you want women to have unsafe, back-alley abortions? That is cruel." And on and on it goes. I will check out the info you shared. Thanks. And some friends have invited me to watch Unborn in the United States with them. I'll check that out too.
That's why only #15 explicitly asked for an explanation. I know it deserves discussion, and at the same time I value "a consistent ethic of life." Anyway, the issue remains with us.
And I can add that the discussion isn't just theoretical for me and my family, but I don't think details would be helpful here.
Thanks again for reading and commenting, for joining in the conversation. Wow, this is a long comment. Peace, Jeff
H: yes ... and this one, "if she wants to end the pregnancy, illegal or not, she WILL find a way." like prohibition during the 20s, it became a hot commodity and didn't reduce the number of problems.
ME: Right.
How about asking:
Did you know that there is no written law that requires US citizens to pay income tax? And if there is one, the IRS will not provide the document in any court case in any court of law?
Did you know that the Federal Reserve Bank is owned by a group of private individuals and that our federal income tax goes to pay the national debt on the money we borrow from the Federal Reserve?
How do you feel abou the Federal Reserve Bank holding ALL of the US gold reserves in their vault as collateral?
Scary....
Sorry.
No written law that requires US citizens to pay FEDERAL INCOME TAX.
State tax is required by law and is used to up-keep roads, schools, libraries and such.
Hola, Helen. I'm back with tardy response. For an easy answer, let me just quote a friend who wrote:
"Regardless of how this primary race turns out, Obama must be credited with bringing a huge number of people – particularly young people and independents – to a process they have until now been disinterested in. Every Democratic primary and caucus has enjoyed record turnout, and his rallies now routinely draw 20,000 people, filling arenas across the country. There is something about this man that excites and invigorates people and he’s translating that energy into votes and financial support. The longer this campaign goes, the more people he seems to win over." (Mark at http://wishiwastaller.blogspot.com/2008/02/let-down-wednesday.html)
For a more systematic answer to your question about voter participation, I found some stats at http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0763629.html.
During times of controversy, it appears that more people rock the vote. For example, after Bush's tumultous first 4-year term in office, voter participation rose to 51.4% from 46.3% in the 2000 election. Still, that's obviously only half of the elligible voters.
And the 51.4% in 2004 was the highest it had been since 1968 when 55.1% cast votes for either Nixon (Republican), Humphrey (Democrat) or Wallace (Independent). Here's how Wikipedia describes that election:
"The United States presidential election of 1968 was a wrenching national experience, and included the assassination of Democratic candidate Robert F. Kennedy, the violence at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, and widespread demonstrations against the Vietnam War across American university and college campuses." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1968)
So all of that turmoil still only brought out just over half the potential voters.
In general more people voted in the sixties than now--1964 (57.8%), 1960(58.5%). Wild times.
The off years (2006, 2002, 1998...) are years when congressional leaders were elected, but there was no presidential election. Voter turnout is consistently lower in these elections. So the presidential election is every four years, but congressional elections for Senators (6 year term; 2 senators per state) and Representatives (2 year term; 435 reps divided proportionally by population of each state) are held every two years.
I don't know how much you know about the U.S. system, so I put in a little more description than you asked for 'cause I have no idea how long term lengths are in South Africa, or even in Korea and I lived there for three years. I read about Korean politics, but never worked out the procedural details.
In conclusion, more people vote in presidential years than in off years, and more people vote during critical debate years, but the primary thing that stands out to me is that on average nearly half of American voters disregard their hard-fought-for civic right and responsibility.
It will be interesting to see how many people get out to vote in this election cycle.
See what you get when you ask me a question and then give me plenty of time to look into it?!
Peace, Jeff
Wow, Travis. You're taking it to a whole new level! I was just talking about policy, and you brought us up a notch to reconsider powers of the national government versus state rights. You're some kind of trouble maker! That's like asking if our two-party system is adequate for true democracy. :)
Peace yo, Jeff
Thanks Jeff! I'd love to look into SA voting numbers, but that will have to wait a few weeks/months/years (?) until life calms down a bit! thanks for the response though, I'm glad to see it's not just us!
Have been following the US politics for a while now, someone finally sat me down and explained the whole "Primaries" thing, so I'm finding it all quite interesting!
That's me... A Badventist (to coin August's term) trouble maker!!!
:)
No response about me coming to visit?!?! come on!!! I'll be there in 5 SHORT WEEKS!!!
"Hear me now and believe me later." Travis, we are quitely muchly looking forward to your visitation. Bring the noise.
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