[Dialogue] the President

[R Williams]

Jann and Sunny,
 
I too have struggled with some of the decisions the President and his administration have made, like for example, the decision to allow super pacs to raise money for his campaign.  Since I can't be happy with all his particular actions, I've had to fall back on his values, and there I believe his are as close to my own as any national candidate for office in my lifetime.  So for now I will continue to trust his foundational values and I will stick with him as my candidate until I feel his values have shifted to the point that I no longer can if I am to maintain my own integrity.
 
Our father in freedom Dietrich Bonhoeffer told us that often the choices are between wrong and wrong, and right and right.  My experience in choosing candidates is that it is always between individuals who are both right and wrong at the same time, that is, there's good and bad in all of them (and, by the way, all of us.)  This is one reason why it is a distortion to demonize those with whom we disagree.
 
The 2008 presidential election was the first for me in which I felt I was voting "for" the candidate I supported rather than "against" the one I did not support .  I confess I'm not as enthusiastic about Obama now as I was last time around, but it is so clear to me that the values of Mitt Romney are so contrary to my own that there is no dilemma whatsoever for me as to who I will vote for.
 
Randy
 
PS  I believe any elected official, who serves a term with an eye toward getting elected for another term, is compromised to one degree or another.  That is why I would support the presidency being limited to one 6-year term.  If Obama is re-elected I believe his lame duck status will allow him to do things he never did in his first term.  I feel this is indicative more of a flaw in the system than a flaw in the man.

"Listen to what is emerging from yourself to the course of being in the world; not to be supported by it, but to bring it to reality as it desires."
-Martin Buber (adapted)
 

________________________________
 From: "LAURELCG at aol.com" <LAURELCG at aol.com>
To: dialogue at lists.wedgeblade.net 
Sent: Monday, June 4, 2012 12:41 PM
Subject: Re: [Dialogue] the President
  

 
I agree. I'm profoundly disappointed in Mr. Obama and his administration. 
First, for leaving the hawks to guard the economic henhouse (Geitner, for 
example), secondly, for taking on more unchecked, unbalanced executive power 
than even George Bush dared. (drone strikes and immigrant deportations 
increased) and this adds a third arena. I pray for orderly evolution to more 
equity and civility. 

Thanks for sharing, Sunny, 
Jann 

In a message dated 6/4/2012 10:08:50 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, 
sunwalker at comcast.net writes: 
Well, my FBI file  grows. I’ve written another president – not one I ever expected to. I followed  Steve Harrington’s link to the cartoon discussion and randomly (you’ve  noticed, it’s how my brain works, sighhhh…) a nearby link. There I found this  comment. So I simply asked the President to heed the words as they will make a  difference in the election: 
>  
>We  hear much about civility in public life, and many colleges now insert civility  discussions into the curriculum.  More and more, President Obama’s  speeches are worth studying as examples of incivility, of precisely what a  president should not do this far out from the election.  Cheap and  puerile, they offer the guilty pleasures of raillery, a moment’s chuckle and a  lengthening contempt for people of different views.  Such rhetoric coming  out of the president’s mouth poisons civic life, for every time he throws a  cynical and insulting characterization to the audience, he licenses the  blowhard talking head, the obnoxious columnist, and hordes of lesser incumbent  politicians in their own campaigns to do the  same. 
>  
>Your  thoughts? 
>  
>Sunny 
>  
>Sunny Walker 
>SunWalker  Enterprises 
>303-587-3017  (cell) 
>303-671-0704  (home/office) 
>sunwalker at comcast.net 
>Aurora,  CO 
>  
>No mattter how  far you've gone down the wrong road, turn back. ~ Turkish  Proverb 
> 
>
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