The "Politics" of America have been traditional "Jousting" of middle aged white men and their cohorts over the last two centuries. From Washington and the Federalists to Jackson (Jacksonian Democrats) and the re-birth of the Democrat Party initially begun by Jefferson to Lincoln and the salvation of the nation, we are about to embark on a new journey in Politics. This time the election of our President will be either the first woman, Hillary Clinton, as President, the first african/white (well he is), Barack Obama, as President or the oldest white male, John McCain, ever elected to the highest office in the land. The 20th Century was a series of "Political Dynasties", with the Roosevelts, Teddy and Franklin, and the Bushes and Clinton's holding sway over the land for about a third of the century from the very beginning to the end. The rest of the story as it were had some non-descript Whitehouse residents such as Taft, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Ford and Carter. What is notable is that ,in my judgment, two of out ten greatest Presidents served immediately after World War ll. Truman and Eisenhower, they were the right people at the right time. I left out a few names from the 20th Century, notably Wilson, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon & Ronald Reagan. The names of Wilson, Kennedy, Johnson & Nixon will always be connected to war and or some sort of corruption. Wilson, World War l, Kennedy for escalating the level of hostilities in Viet Nam prior to his death and Johnson for making a mess of Vietnam because of Sec. Of Defense Robert McNamara and Nixon having to extricate us from Viet Nam not so adroitly. Watergate will live in infamy when one thinks of Dick Nixon............. Ronald Reagan is held up as the father of Conservatism, not so, that would be Barry Goldwater. He alas, was never in the Whitehouse, at least as President. Goldwater did have the unenviable task of making the house call to Richard Nixon telling him he had lost all Political Support and it was time for him to go. Back to Ronald Reagan. What he was was the ideal person at the ideal time. He was the master delegator, lucky for him he had a reasonably good staff. Ronald Reagan did walk us and the Soviet Union through their ultimate dissolution/incarnation. Reagan & Gorbachev will be remembered for changing the face of the world geo-politically. Hillary Clinton is the old school Democrat who has changed her stripes more times than any tiger. Hillary Clinton was the darling of the "elite" when she and Bill Clinton first cast their shadow in Washington D. C.. She is now the progressive darling of the down-trodden blue collar Democrats. This is only due to the fact that Barack Obama has supplanted Hillary Clinton as the golden boy/girl of the college educated, well to do liberal democrats. Hillary Clinton needed to fall back to some group. The Blue Collar Democrats were as good as any........... John McCain is a decent man, just not the right man to be President. At 72 years old this year it is not the right call to elect John McCain as President. That brings us to Barack Obama. Senator Obama is not Pure, maybe that is a good thing. No Politician is Pure. What Senator Obama is is a breathe of fresh air in the grimy world of Politics. Our Nation has mortgaged the future of those yet to be born. We have the George W. Bush administration to thank for this mess. Iraq, our economy, our military all have been squandered with no thought given to the aftermath. Barack Obama will have a mountain to climb. He will need the support of every politician and every citizen if he is ever to be successful. The only choice to make in this election year is to elect Barack Obama as President of these United States. So, as I stated at the beginning of this piece our nation has choices never available to our voters in the past two hundred plus years. Let's then make good use of this choice and change opportunity. We need to break the bonds of the past and not allow ourselves to further fall into the morass of inexorable futility and once again revive the American spirit of can do...............
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