Blog Pillaging

I have had a hard time articulating the reasons I am choosing to vote "blue" for the first time in my life.  My friend, Patrick (www.eternityisaday.blogspot.com) is blogging his reasons for voting Obama, and I couldn't resist the temptation to plagiarize his genius.  Here is the post, which I copied and pasted directly on to my blog.  I will continue to pillage his blog as he makes future entries.
Ability vs. Experience

I thought it might be a good idea to write down some of the reasons why I'm voting for Obama so I can start referring family members, friends, and neighbors to my blog instead of wasting several more hours engaging in debates with people I love. For my first installment, I thought I would analyze the difference between "experience" and "ability" to address the popular concern that Obama lacks McCain's experience.

First, "experience" doesn't necessarily translate into "ability." Obama was editor-in-chief of the Harvard Law Review (the first Black in the history of the school) and is on the verge of becoming the 3rd youngest president in the history of the country, despite overwhelming odds against him. McCain, on the other hand, graduated in the bottom 1% in his class at Annopolis (No. 894 out of 899 to be precise). I'm not saying that school achievements necessarily dictate a person's entire life, but when it comes to someone's ability to run a country, it certainly raises a red flag when a candidate was only 5 people away from graduating last out of a class of 899 students. Obama is winning a lot of independent and conservative votes because he appears to be smarter, more talented, and better tempered than McCain. In other words, Obama's perceived "ability" is trumping McCain's "experience" in the minds of many voters, including conservatives like George W. Bush's former Secretary of State, Colin Powell. I thought Powell'sexplanation for his support of Obama aptly described the reasons why so many people, including conservatives, have openly supported Obama's candidacy.

Second, McCain's 25 years of experience can't save him from his VP nomination. Unlike the concerns about Obama's lack of experience, the concerns about Palin actually involve her intellectual fitness. What good are McCain's 25 years of experience if he can't be trusted to select a vice president capable of surviving an interview with Katie Couric without complete embarrassment? I realize this might offend a lot of people, but be honest, do you really want a vice president that has to be shielded from the media because she can't be trusted to answer questions about her political views and her record as Alaska's governor?

Third, I think Obama is smart enough and cares enough about his historical legacy that he won't become a liberal communist like all the right-wingers in the world think. All presidents tend to move toward the center, particularly those who, unlike George W. Bush, like ideas and welcome opposing viewpoints (see, for example,Team of Rivals, a fine book about Abraham Lincoln, which analyzes how Lincoln brought together advisers who often strongly disagreed with him). McCain, on the other hand, has a legacy of taking unsafe risks (whether it be wrecking air planes in the military or nominating a vice presidential candidate that scares 75% of Americans). McCain himself touts himself as a "maverick." I would think that 25 years of experience in Congress would teach you that acting like a maverick isn't the best way to run a government and protect a country.

So, ultimately, I am willing to take a chance on someone who might turn out to be an incredible president as opposed to playing it "safe" with someone who hasn't proven to be incredible even after 25 years in office and, in some ways, someone who has proven to lack well-tempered judgment. At this critical time in our country's history, I don't think we can afford to play it safe with a self-proclaimed maverick. Instead, I think it's safer to "bet it all on Black."