I’m not really a political person, preferring to devote my interest to popular cultural things such as fiction and music. I was raised in a family which was adamantly-Republican. While I grew up I listened to endless rants about the evil Franklin Roosevelt and the wonderful Dwight David Eisenhower. Liberals waste all our money, Conservatives protect it, Bobby Kennedy was either a fool or misguided, and Richard Nixon deserved to finish his term in office with dignity, not railroaded out of office like a common criminal!

Well, teaching has broadened my views considerably. The world is not the black and white place many people would like it to be. “Trickle-down” economics does not work. Protecting every last cent of my net worth against taxation does nothing to help the impoverished, the environment, our road system, or much of anything. I tend to vote independent of political parties, looking at the person’s overall beliefs and attitude before stepping into the voting booth.

On a state level, I thought Tom Kean was a wonderful governor, and I did not blame Jim Florio for raising taxes at all. Christie Whitman sold out our state’s future for popularity. On a national level, I thought Jimmy Carter was the most caring, humanistic president in my lifetime; too bad he was totally incompetent as a leader. Ronald Reagan had leadership enough for two presidents, but his basic attitude of “if it’s good enough for me, it’s good enough for the world” did not sit well with my humanitarian side.

Bill Clinton was certainly not respectable as a human being (nor as a husband and father), but he was a darned good president. That brings us to George W. Bush. Let’s see, he is the stupidest president I’ve known, a compulsive liar who first tried to convince the country that Saddam Hussein was involved in the attack on the World Trade Towers and, when that failed, he invented that whole “axis of evil” crap and the “weapons of mass destruction”. His primary concerns are protecting the pocketbooks of his rich friends and controlling as much Middle Eastern oil as possible. And, let’s face it, he is a pawn in the hands of Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, with only as much power as the Republican elite allows him to have.

John Kerry undoubtedly has weaknesses as a president candidate, but compared to Dubya he is Mother Theresa as compared to Lucretia Borgia. I believe this country will be in trouble with four more years of a Bush administration, and in serious trouble if his backers can control the White House for another eight years afterwards. So I’m voting for Kerry and encourage all my readers to do the same!