After almost four years of active campaigning, the time has come.  In just a few days, America will collectively choose a president.  On November 6th, I will be casting my vote for our current president Mr. Barack Obama.  I believe this decision is important and complex enough to expound upon somewhat further; not for reasons of persuasion or justification, but rather for communication and documentation.

The Economy.  This topic is incredibly complex and is wrought with dueling statistics and expert panels.  Even the most ignorant of the myriad experts on either side know much more than me on this topic, so I will not deign to try to judge among them.  However, I believe that Mr. Romney’s plan for the economy relies entirely too much on trust.  Trust that the economy will grow at an accelerated rate to help him afford his tax cuts.  Trust that “job creators” will reinvest  their tax savings to hire more workers, rather than cash in profits or take them overseas.  And finally, trust that we will forget that the “Reagan Recovery” he so hopes to emulate led to one of the largest explosions of the national debt in history.  Mr. Obama inherited an economy in free fall, which arguably hit its nadir about six months into his presidency.  To expect us to be completely recovered in only three years is to defy the cyclical nature of history.

Foreign Policy.  Mr. Obama’s foreign policy can seem at first glance to be somewhat muddled and haphazard.  However, I believe this stems from the inherent complexities of international relations in our interconnected world.  I much prefer Mr. Obama’s painstaking deliberation to treat each situation uniquely as well as his wholehearted attempts at multilateralism to Mr. Romney’s one-size-fits-all, with-us-or-against-us approach.  Mr. Romney’s attempts to attack Mr. Obama for being “soft” in Iran or Syria leave no room for him to maneuver except to embroil the United States in more foreign wars which we cannot afford.  Further, while it is vitally important for us to have an unquestioned staunch ally in a volatile region like the Middle East, that is no excuse to equate Israel’s national interests with our own.  While they often do align, and mutual protection is a foundation for our alliance, our national interests must be our own, and must be the President’s focus at all times.

Health Care.  It actually matters very little who becomes President in this regard.  The fact is that Medicare is an extremely expensive entitlement program our nation can no longer afford.  For political reasons, neither side is willing to directly cut benefits to voters, and both sides have pledged to save money.  This must necessarily result in reduced reimbursement to healthcare providers–and subsequently to indirect reductions in benefits through more providers dropping Medicare patients, rationing of care, or the market producing less or lower quality physicians.  The one alternative solution, sweeping malpractice tort reform, has unfortunately not made it to the conversation during this cycle.

Civil Rights.   Mr. Obama has been no saint on civil rights, from failing to close Guantanamo to quietly continuing warrantless wiretapping and other surveillance.  However, the Republicans have squandered the Muslim vote for a generation through a replay of their Southern Strategy.  By systematically demonizing Muslims at the party level, they have made it impossible for us to vote for them.  Michelle Malkin (who advocates placing all Muslims in internment camps) may be a fringe player in the Republican party, but Michelle Bachmann (who advocates a Muslim witch hunt to root out Muslims in the federal government), Herman Cain (who would apply a Muslim litmus test prior to hiring anyone), Newt Gingrich (who compares Muslims to Nazis), and Tom Tancredo (who advocates bombing Mecca and Medina) are most certainly not–in fact, all of them ran for president under the Republican banner.  Add to that the right’s insistence of propagating the Obama crypto-Muslim story as a slur and you have a veritable definition of Islamophobia.  Even the current nominee, Mr. Romney, said in a debate he would not consider a qualified Muslim for a cabinet level post since Muslims do not constitute a large enough proportion of the population to justify it–a reasoning that should also exclude a Mormon from becoming president.  Hiring or not hiring someone based on their religion is a violation of their civil rights and fundamental American principles, and no American (Muslim or otherwise) should allow such violations to creep into governing philosophy.

Leadership. This is perhaps the toughest to judge, and the toughest to quantify.  However, certain anecdotes truly cement this in Mr. Obama’s favor.  First is the decision to green-light the mission to kill Osama Bin Laden.  While in retrospect it seems like an easy decision, prospectively it is much muddier.  There are a myriad of ways this mission could have gone disastrously wrong.  Imagine being engaged in Pakistani airspace by fighter jets we had sold them.  Or storming the compound and mistakenly killing innocent women and children only to find intelligence about Osama’s whereabouts were wrong.  Or having Osama escape, and chasing him through a sovereign country’s streets only to have our strikeforce overcome by a violent mob of Pakistanis.  Almost any alternate scenario would have been an international embarrassment or worse, and would have led to a premature end to Mr. Obama’s political career.  Yes, it is easy for Mr. Romney to say in retrospect he would have done the same thing now that the outcome is known.  It takes leadership and courage to proceed with an uncertain outcome.

Another major test of leadership came this summer, when Mr. Biden unwittingly dragged his boss into the fray of gay marriage.  Mr. Obama was already fully engaged in a re-election campaign which he knew very well would be a fight for the center-ground of the electorate.  Yet, he used the opportunity to state his own personal viewpoint (which risked alienating many middle ground voters) without pandering or massaging it, and without forcing its acceptance by others.  Mr. Romney, by contrast, has shown time and again that he is unwilling or unable to stand up to even the fringes of his party, as evidenced by his newfound criticism of Planned Parenthood–an organization that he found worthy of charitable contribution just a few short years ago.  I simply cannot and will not cede the right to appoint lifetime Supreme Court Justices to someone who has shown a remarkable inability to withstand political pressure.

Mr. Obama has not been a perfect president by any means.  He has not been the president I imagined he would be nor, I venture, the president he imagined he would be.  However, he has certainly made considerable progress amid formidable challenges and united opposition.  Mr. Romney, by contrast, has revealed himself as weak-willed and short-sighted.  On November 6th, I will proudly vote to give Mr. Obama the second term he has earned.

The second presidential debate just ended, and the internet is abuzz with post-debate spin and analysis.  Unfortunately, the post-debate articles could just as easily have been written before the debate, with a few pesky details to be filled in later, because the actual debate was largely a foregone conclusion.  It consisted of two candidates being asked a certain predictable set of questions from a limited set of topics.  The candidates then focus on one particular word in the question, mentally cross-reference that word with a paragraph from their stump speech and deliver that paragraph, often ignoring the actual question. On every third question, they also invent a down-on-their luck person they met on the campaign trail who used said issue to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Thus, a very astute question on the scope of federal government (should it have a role in setting gas prices) turns into a discussion on clean coal, simply because the word “energy” was mentioned in the question.  Or a potentially explosive discussion on interagency communication breakdown (as evidenced by requests for security funding for embassies) turns into a sparring over word-choice regarding terrorism.   The candidates end up not so much debating as giving dueling mini-speeches–an unfortunate microcosm of our current political discourse where the two sides talk at each other rather than to each other.

In the midst of all of this, facts and figures which are often totally contradictory get bandied about with reckless abandon,  making it so that drilling on federal lands can both increase and decrease over the same time period (depending on the metric and comparators used).  It is a testament to the degraded quality of our collective political discourse that the most accurate statement out of either campaign on strategy was when Romney’s campaign stated they would not let their campaign be “run by a bunch of fact-checkers.”  I believe that for better or for worse (for worse, in my opinion), they got that point exactly right.  In politics, perception is reality, the rest is just facts.  A bell once rung can be silenced, but never unrung.  Thus, Republicans can fact-check Obama’s Libya comments all they want, and even if the President is proven completely wrong, it will at best only serve as feeble damage control for the GOP.

For too long have we let the candidates and the campaigns police themselves for truth and veracity.  They have obviously proven inept or unwilling to do so.  It is time for us to step in and (gasp!) hold our candidates responsible for their statements in real time.  I would propose that the easiest and most universal venue for doing so is the Commission on Presidential Debates.  The debates currently start with a coin toss– a simple and mostly fair method to determine who goes first and one shared with many professional sports.  Perhaps we can borrow other rules from pro-sports to make the debate more meaningful, useful, and truthful.

For the sake of human nature, please take a moment to imagine President Obama in a football helmet dousing himself with gatorade, then flexing and screaming.  Got it? Good.  Now that you’ve got it out of your system, let’s get serious.

Here are some specific suggestions:

1) Challenge flags.  Each candidate can choose three opportunities in the debate to interrupt his opponent for a real time fact check by an unbiased panel of fact checkers.  If the challenger loses the first two, however, the third is rescinded.  This introduces an impetus for truth as well as an eye for strategy (something I’d like our commander in chief to have)

2) Play clock.  The great lesson of Watergate was that the President is not above the law.  Why, then, should they be above the rules?  If a candidate is given two minutes to answer, they should be held to that rule.  The mic for both candidate should be cut immediately after their allotted time for speaking is over.  A president should be able to handle pressure calmly, prioritize quickly, and communicate effectively and succinctly.  This handles all of those attributes.

3) Time outs.  The executive branch of government is more than just a person.  It is an entire team of individuals charged with keeping the legislature and judiciary in check.  For every major decision, we expect the president to confer with his chief advisors.  And yet, during the debates a candidate is all alone.  Between topics, would it be so bad for each candidate to choose  to huddle with his advisors to discuss general strategy and pertinent points to make/avoid, etc? In the end, the candidate on the stage would maintain final control over each decision, just as we expect a governing president to.

4) The Blitz.  President Obama effectively criticized Senator McCain in 2008 for suspending his campaign to solve the economic crisis by claiming a president “should be able to walk and chew gum at the same time”.  There is no point in the debate where a candidate’s mettle is truly tested.  No truly stressful point in a debate where a president must perform under unexpected pressure.   This could come in any of a myriad of forms, each with its own challenges.  Would the candidate be forced to speak over loud microphone feedback?  With a time-clock that is inexplicably draining in double-time?  Answer two disparate questions at once, or be posed with a second question halfway through answering the first?  Nobody could foresee some of the historical events of the past decade.  It would be imminently reasonable to expect a president to deal with unforeseen challenges.

I know this analogy is prone to lampooning.  But these approaches are used in professional sports simply because they work in an enterprise where fairness and accountability are the keystones of the entire business model.  Shouldn’t we expect at least as much from our presidential candidates?

(Hat tip to my friend Ali Yusufaly for the general inspiration for this post.)

This nation is badly split.  The presidential election this cycle accurately reflects the acrimony and small-ness that pervades our political perceptions.  As we perseverate over minutiae, our country languishes in self-imposed malaise and our economy teeters on the brink of disaster.   What makes the hyperpartisanship worse is the fact that the country is split almost 50/50 on either side of the divide.

Does any of us really believe that this will change after the 2012 election?  It is unrealistic to think (just as it was in 2008) that we will magically rally around our president and our congress to tackle the major issues of our time.  Given the likely divided nature of our government, and the definitely divided nature of the electorate, the American public can look forward to more fiddling while Rome burns even under the term of the next president.

It is a common theme in presidential politics that first term presidents often “pivot” to the political center in order to buff their chances for re-election, while second-term presidents are “unleashed” from those concerns to return to their idealogical base.

However, Mr. Romney has made too many promises and sold too much of his political capital to the far right of his party to credibly govern as a compromising moderate if he wins.  During his first term, President Romney would need to burnish his credentials as a bona fide conservative in order to convince his base (who is luke warm on him currently) that he is not deserving of a primary challenge.  While President Romney would no doubt vanquish such a challenge, it would be the ultimate pyrrhic victory and likely fatally wound his re-election campaign.  Thus, shortly after election we can realistically expect a lurch to the right from President Romney, which would likely worsen gridlock (without a senate supermajority) and increase the shrill tones of partisan debate.

President Obama, for all of his soaring rhetoric, has not shown a tremendous aptitude for bipartisan leadership and unification of the electorate.  While there may be many reasons for this, it is safe to say that a fair portion of the blame can be laid at his own feet.  As an “unleashed” lame duck president, the right wing warns, he would be free to turn sharply to the left and lead as the unabashed liberal that he inclines to be.  This would also serve (with a Republican house) to worsen gridlock and partisanship.

Lest we get too depressed, there is a glimmer of hope in these scenarios, and it comes from the unlikeliest of sources–President Clinton.  In 2008, it was clear that President Bill Clinton was smarting from the rough and tumble primary contest between his wife Hillary and Mr. Obama.  He was scarce on the campaign trail, and reticent with his endorsements.  In 2012, however, President Clinton gave a tremendous speech at the Democrat’s convention, and has been full-throated in his endorsement of the current president.  It is widely assumed that he is playing nice within the party to help ease Hillary’s (unopposed?) march to the Democratic nomination in 2016.  It is conceivable, and even likely, that in exchange for the badly needed enthusiastic endorsement, President Obama has agreed to throw the full weight of his personality, and his office, behind Hillary’s presumed run in 2016.

President Clinton’s endorsement of Obama has held real value in this cycle.  And in return, President Obama will need to give Hillary something of real value back.  In a very real sense, then, he will not be able to lead as the unleashed liberal that he is, taunting Republicans with brinksmanship at every turn.  Such a term would be considered a failure, and a failed President’s endorsement and party would hold no value.  In that situation all he could deliver to Hillary was his base, a consituency she arguably is more comfortable with than he is.  He will be forced, for her sake and due to promises made, to govern and lead through unification and compromise, in order to win over the middle ground of American politics, the independent voter.

There is good reason to believe that Mr. Romney’s first term would be reminiscent of an “unleashed” second-term president, whereas Mr. Obama’s second term would be more reminiscent of an accountable first-term president.  Given the choice, I prefer a president who feels accountable and motivated to move to the middle any day.

The 2012 Presidential campaign has been marred by intensely vicious, personal attacks.  Many of these are totally unfair and unbecoming of those men seeking to become leaders of the free world.  Unfounded attacks on a person’s “American-ness”, his wealth, his faith, his place of birth, or the color of his skin have no place in our current debate.  One attack, however, is particularly stinging because of its truth… That of Mr. Romney’s “flip-flopping” on key issues.

Mr. Romney’s waffling positions on social issues are famous by now, from his support for abortion rights (and his charitable contributions to Planned Parenthood) to his vehemently pro-life stance.  Likewise, his support for gay marriage has shifted to a vehement opposition.  His shifting positions on policy are also gaining more and more attention.  As governor of Massachusetts, he advocated and argued for an individual health care insurance mandate, one he now argues is unconstitutional.  At various times, he has come out both for and against a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.

To many, these shifting policy stands disqualify Mr. Romney for the presidency.  In my view, they represent an asset which may uniquely qualify him for the job.

The Presidency of the United States, as it is conceived and expected, requires almost superhuman capabilities.  The President, after all, is not a king nor a dictator imposing his whims or his views on the people.  He is an elected executive who ideally represents a “first among equals” among citizens; meant solely to provide checks and balances to the legislature, and to speed along the beaureaucratic process.  Importantly, the president is elected to represent the people.  Not just the people of his home district (like a congressman), or the people of his state (like a senator), or the people of his party (like a chairperson) but the entire citizenry of the United States–equally responsible for considering the welfare of the coalminer in West Virginia, the Sierra Club member in California, and yes, the casino magnate in Las Vegas.

We rightfully demand principled leadership from our most prominent representative.  However, we do not often reflect upon what principles we are demanding.  Principled leadership is extremely important–when it comes to the principles which we all share.   Defense against common enemies, shared prosperity, freedom and liberty, and many others explicit and tacitly implied in the constitution.  If Mr. Romney is elected, and is pressured to pursue a militantly pro-life agenda (just using this issue as an example), he is doing a disservice to a large segment of his own constituents who are equally vehemently pro-choice; and thus not doing his job to represent the American people as a whole.  He was not elected to be the President of the Republican Party, after all, but to be the President of the United States of America (even of those who didn’t vote for him).

Many of the issues a president must confront deal with less constitutionally clear decisions. In these cases,  flexibility, an open mind, and the ability to see all sides of an issue are paramount.  Misplaced rigidity leads to a hyperpartisan atmosphere, disenfranchisement, gridlock, resentment, and eventually political instability.  On those issues where legitimate disagreement exists (and it always will) regarding an interpretation of our core values (eg: does abortion violate a right to life, or does banning it violate a right to freedom?), a president must have the ability to carefully weigh all opinions and all listen to all parties, and only then reach a conclusion which he will be responsible for communicating to his constituents.

A candidate who has spent his life cultivating and defending a single world view on social or economic issues will have a considerably harder time considering the rights, welfare, and arguments of all of his constituents than one who has spent time on both sides of an issue.  Mr. Romney’s colorful history, to me, means that he has carefully considered all sides of an issue, and at various times in his life convinced himself of the merits of each side of an argument.  It means that he recognizes that a single approach is not appropriate in every situation, and that complex issues have complex answers.  Even if it just represents politically expedient pandering, it belies the understanding that his constituency has diverse and disparate interests.

There are many reasons I may not vote for Mr. Romney, but his flip-flopping will not be one of them.

Rick Santorum has shown incredible perseverance so far in this GOP primary season.  Initially considered as a bit player, he has rocketed to national prominence on the strength of some strong primary and caucus wins, and now deserves at least legitimate discussion as a GOP nominee.  Anyone (including Mr. Santorum) who claims to have predicted his degree of relevancy this late in the race should seriously have their honesty questioned.  And yet, here he is.

It is true that Mr. Romney, his main rival and the current frontrunner, is a deeply flawed candidate.  His shifting stances on hot-button issues such as abortion and universal health care are well documented.  His wealth leads to a potentially very accurate and thus lethal charge of being “out of touch”.  And his recent campaign strategy of “vote for me, I’m inevitable anyway” reeks of defensiveness and pushiness at the same time.

Mr. Santorum, however, is arguably no better–and perhaps worse off.  He is a staunch conservative, but his views on most social issues steer far right of the majority of the American populace.  His economic credentials are questionable, as is his foreign policy experience.  His last foray into politics ended in an 18 point shellacking in his home state.

Perhaps a reason for his surprising success can be found in the contests so far.  I have neither the time nor the expertise of great political (and baseball statistician) Nate Silvers, but some trends are too clear to miss.  If one evaluates the states that hold primaries (as opposed to caucuses) and separates them according to open (anyone can vote) v. closed (only registered republicans can vote) primaries, we have the following results:

(For the sake of simplicity, I have only compared Santorum and Romney and removed states where one or the other was not on the ballot, or that any major candidate claims as their home state.  National polls are from RCP polling data (average of polls) on the date of the primary).

In states with open primaries Santorum tends to outperform his national polling data significantly–in fact, by an average of 11.5 points.  In states with closed primaries, he tends to underperform compared to national polling by an average of 11.75 points.  That is over a 23 point swing!

Although this is not a complete analysis (accounting for regional differences, etc), the magnitude of the difference is clearly significant.  The difference in the type of primaries is entirely comprised of the ability of Democrats and Independents to vote.  It is not a stretch to surmise that Mr. Santorum and his extreme right wing views on social issues, his vitriol towards President Obama, and his radical  religious rhetoric does not embody significant crossover appeal.

It thus stands to consideration that the Democrats (and perhaps independents) are using the open primaries to help nominate Mr. Santorum.  In their eyes, this is a win-win situation–they either succeed in propping up a “straw-man”, who (at least in their estimation) is an easier candidate for Mr. Obama to beat in November, or they help deplete Mr. Romney’s war chest by using Mr. Santorum as a surrogate with which to attack the front runner.

A similar strategy was espoused by Rush Limbaugh in 2008 and dubbed “Operation Chaos” as he urged his listeners to participate in open primaries to drag out the Democratic nominating process, and it has been reborn this year by the Daily Kos, and dubbed “Operation Hilarity.“  The scary thing is, such tactics may actually work.

The Democrats who are doing this are playing a dangerous game.  By swinging for the fences, they are hoping for a home run–ie, President Obama walking to re-election against who they see is an inferior candidate.  But if they succeed in influencing the nomination, they will have helped nominate an extreme social conservative and religious radical, and given him the confidence that no race is out of reach.  At that point, all it would take is one damning picture or quote released at the right time to help create… President Santorum.  And then, perhaps, President Romney wouldn’t look so bad to these Democrats.

When it comes to the generations long struggle between the Israelis and Palestinians, I am no expert.  There is too much water under the bridge, and too many details of a history I was neither there for, nor had the time to study independently in depth.  I am aware of the complaints of the Israelis regarding their security in what they see as their ancestral homeland, and also aware of the complaints of Palestinians regarding their displacement and alleged subsequent mistreatment at the hands of the Israelis.

But as a father of two girls, there is one thing I am an expert in, and that is conflict resolution.  I am reminded somewhat of a situation in which my children were fighting in the back seat of the car, eventually coming to blows.  As I tried to sort out the situation, they just kept hitting each other and screaming about how the Papa Smurf toy was THEIRS.  In between hair-pulls and snatching the toy, both made reasonable semi-coherent points about why they should get the toy.  As I hurtled down the freeway, I said what I think most parents would say in the situation “Calm down, stop hitting each other and give me Papa Smurf!”  By stopping the violence, and removing the offending toy, I was hoping to determine with a clear mind a reasonable solution to the problem–though I knew it would inevitably involve some sort of sharing, and neither girl was likely to be completely satisfied.

The point is that the first step in this process was to stop the violence.  As long as the two girls were hitting each other, the argument would escalate and no agreement would be able to be reached.  While this analogy is unacceptably lighthearted for such a serious situation, and is no doubt imperfect (whither Papa Smurf and whither holy Jerusalem?), some important parallels can indeed be drawn.

The Palestinian argument for the violent Intifada, in plain English, can be boiled down to the basic sentiment “We need to stand up and defend ourselves, or else Israel will obliterate us and our homeland completely.”  The violent component of the Israeli response is summarized as “We need to stand up and defend ourselves against these violent peoples who threaten our security and our ability/right to exist”.  Is it any wonder than, that we have ended up in an ever escalating vicious cycle of bloodshed?

The only way out of this situation is to first, stop the violence.  And to do this, one side will need to have the courage to act first.  As the group claiming to be oppressed, that onus clearly falls to the Palestinians.  To claim oppression is to claim a certain moral high ground, which is the main weapon of the oppressed.  As long as they persist in violent uprising (or defense, based on one’s perspective), they will have ceded this all important moral high ground to those they accuse of oppression.  The only reasonable course of action currently is to insist on a total stop to all violent action (aggressive or defensive) on behalf of the Palestinians.

If, in fact, the Palestinians are right and Israel represents a group of aggressors committed to Palestinian oppression if not total annihilation, this will become abundantly clear as Israeli violence continues or itensifies in the face of Palestinian non-violence.  Such action would then stand glaringly obvious in the international spotlight, exposed for its ugliness.  If, however, Israel is correct in their assertion that their violent actions are merely defensive in nature, the entire impetus for violence directed against the Palestinians will disappear as Palestinians lay down their arms.  Peace can then move forward.

The Palestinians win either scenario.  Either Israel is exposed for the violent imperialist power that they believe it is, world pressure comes to bear, and the Palestinians are treated to world sympathy; or violence stops and peace prevails based necessarily on a two-state solution.  Yes, there will be short term losses, but those losses are already occurring.  And if Israel is truly the peaceful giant it claims to be, it likewise has nothing to fear and everything to gain from this turn of events.

The question comes up, where will the Palestinians find a leader strong enough to convince them that the non-violent resistance of Ghandi and King are potential answers to their problems?  A leader willing to forsake short term gains and demagoguery for long term solutions? A leader willing to admit that justice is less important than peace, the past less important than the future?  Hope continues that such a leader will arise from among them.  However, among the current players, only one possesses the credibility to advance such a solution–Hamas.  Hopefully they realize that in the struggle for peace, the best place to find a helping hand is at the end of their own arm.

Note to the reader: I realize this is an inflammatory topic and struggled with the decision of whether or not to post this at all for that reason.  However, I do believe this post accurately reflects my views, and as such do not fear in publicizing them.  I do fear them being misinterpreted however.  To reiterate, my intention is not to express my (essentially meaningless) support for either side in this existential struggle, but rather to emphasize that regardless of “right” or “wrong”, the initial steps towards peace are the same.  I implore any who choose to comment to keep their comments respectful of those with different viewpoints.