Eric, I believe that Senator McCain is a bonafide warmonger and is just itching to start a war with Iran. Two simultaneous wars are too many already.

Remember how he demonized NAFTA while sending aides to quietly tell his friends in the Canadian government that he didn’t really believe his protectionist rhetoric.

Obama is a machine politician from Chicago. Now, the Chicago machine is pretty totalitarian. However, they are also adept in figuring out what lines they should not cross. That is why Chicage is still thriving despiute its heavy taxes and massive amounts of economic regulation.

If he were from Detroit, a city that has been economically destroyed by its local political machine I would say something different about him.

And Brad, I think that while the bulk of the people want activist government, we have the youth. The Internet is a wild place with few laws. Yet they use it every day. Based on their experiences, I think they will understand Hayek’s observations about order arising spontaneously from the bottom up. These people’s minds are fertile ground for classical liberal ideas.

I honestly think that classical liberalism will be making a comeback in the coming generations. The tide of history has turned and time is on our side.

I agreed up until this point:

8 years of unopposed rule has discredited the Republicans. Once the Democrats are similarly in disgrace, people will be far more receptive to the idea that activist government should be rejected.

“The people” are in favor of activist government. When it fails to meet their ends, they think electing someone else to head it will solve the problem. You and I know that it won’t, but “the people” are notoriously unable to learn the lessons of history.

When Obama and the Democrats don’t usher in the era of peace, harmony, and plenty that their supporters expect, “the people” will simply switch their allegiance to the next empty suit promising solutions he can’t provide.

Obama, on the other hand, strikes me as someone who recognizes that to thrive, a parasite must not consume more than its host can sustain.”
-tarran

Wow… I would love for you (tarran) to further explain this line of thought.

Please keep in mind that Sen. Obama doesn’t have to make certain decisions himself. He simply has to appoint specific Supreme Court Justices…

When McCain’s policies go badly, he starts demonizing those whom he sees as saboteurs. The man has a serious anger management problem.

If he were to win the presidency, McCain would be see his policies run up against the limits of governmental power. these limits would take the form of policies that failed due to non-cooperation or budgetary crises. And I think he would meet these limits to his power with force, demanding laws and regulations that would force people to do what he wanted to do.

Obama, on the other hand, strikes me as someone who recognizes that to thrive, a parasite must not consume more than its host can sustain.

Face it, the next persident of the United States will be someone who believes that the individual is of no importance in comparison with the existence of the nation, that the position of the individual is conditioned solely by the interests of the nation as a whole.

Obama is more liekly to reconize the limits on his own power though. Ths, the case can be made that Obama will be less destructive than McCain. Furthermore, I think nothing would discredit the Democrats so thoroughly as reigning for 8 years with control of both the legislature and the presidency.

8 years of unopposed rule has discredited the Republicans. Once the Democrats are similarly in disgrace, people will be far more receptive to the idea that activist government should be rejected.

As a matter of fact, that’s (in so many words) exactly what I’m saying to as many people as I can.

Just FYI to ‘TKC’…

When the ‘lesser of two evils’ is the current underdog, not voting IS a vote for Sen. Obama.

Other than that… ‘OilnWater’ has the right idea…

I also don’t discount the fact that on occasion even the so called “conservative justices have also voted against liberty

“on occasion”? Try “with equal regularity”. I shudder to think about what would happen to things like due process with a panel of law and order conservative justices.

Yes, McCain is right on the 2nd ammendment, but he’s wrong on many (most?) of the others.

I won’t be happy with any justice picked by either candidate, so….

So either play the game by the rules, don’t play the game, or change the rules.

…I’ll choose the last two options.

So I simply won’t make it. I’ll be staying home come election day.

Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms…. The right of citizens to bear arms is just one guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America but which historically has proven to be always possible.

Hubert H. Humphrey