Why I'm voting for Obama. My last political post this year.

Had a customer/friend in the other day, and I told him I was disappointed that Obama was not more liberal.  He seemed surprised that anyone could be to the left of Obama.  Yet, by my reckoning, I think Obama is a centrist, establishment guy, and pretty much always was.

It's only the loony right wing who could have managed to portray him as something else.

I'm not wholeheartedly for Obama.  I mean, there is zero chance I won't vote for him, but I wish he hadn't done some things and wish he had done other things.

I'm disappointed that he didn't do more to rein in Wall Street.  I think Geithner is his Rumsfeld. But the alternative is a guy who announced INTENTION is to give even more to the Wall Street types?

No doubt who I'm for there.

The foreign policy?  I think Obama had taken the powers handed him by the Bush/9/11 powerplay, and tried to expand them.  Certainly he didn't roll them back. There are lots of troubling privacy issues there.  For a liberal, I'm a bit of vengeful hawk, and while part of me thinks the drone war is immoral, part of me says get them bastards.

Again, the alternative is some guy who's foreign policy team seems to be full of neo-cons who seem to want to go to war with Iran.  We've already had at least one too many wars.

Again, no doubt who I'm for there.

On the economy, I think Obama gave in to the Wall Street interests, and didn't do enough for those on Main Street who were losing their houses and businesses.  However, he did stabilize the economy against the opposition of the other party.  Indeed, almost any initiative he tried to make was blocked by either the Blue Dog democrats or the entire Republican part -- and the idiotic --senate rules.

Again, I think he was dealing with a recalcitrant congress, and probably did about as well as was allowed.  (I might wish he was a L.B.J. type who could twist their arms and manipulate them, but alas, I think Obama is nice guy.)  Obamacare didn't go far enough, in my opinion, but he probably got what he could get.

The other guy -- well, he's a mess on that subject, isn't he?  What the hell does he really believe?  That his Mass. health plan was great and he should get credit for it?  But that it would be a disaster for the rest of us?

I don't much like Romney or his riches and his seemingly out of touch style.  But I wouldn't not vote for him strictly on that basis.  (Even though my saying is, "Eat the Rich.")  Kennedy and Roosevelt and some other effective presidents weren't exactly hoi polloi.  It isn't his secret thoughts that disturbed me -- well, they are pretty bad but they seem in line with his outer thoughts, don't they?  He's all but said he's thinks making the rich richer is the best strategy.  Whereas, I don't think it's worked.

On social issues, I'm pretty much with Obama all the way.  For that reason, if no other, I'd vote for him.  Especially with the Supreme Court as the ultimate arbiter.

Finally, I really believe the Republican party has gone off the rails, and they need to repudiate the wingnuts instead of catering to them. Sure both party have nuts, but one part seems to be run by them.

I could wish MSNBC wouldn't try to follow the example of Fox news.  But even now, I don't think they're quite so reality challenged.

This to me is very disturbing.  The extremism I see in the Republican part is kind of scary.

Again, I'll vote for Obama to try and put that scary genie back in the bottle.

I'm not out for an argument here.  This is an attempt at a non-ideological examination of why I'm going to vote for Obama.  Well, of course its ideological in that I'm a liberal and most likely to vote for the more liberal of candidates.  But even if I look at it from a purely pragmatic viewpoint, I think one candidate is an adult who has been on a steep learning curve, and the other is a candidate who had catered to the worst elements of his party.

So Obama, 2012!