Obama vs Romney, who are you voting for and why?

[NiceMimi]

Several reasons why I’m voting NOT voting for Obama:

1. He has blatantly ignored the Constitution on many occassions. The most serious is his blatant lies to our church leaders, and trying to force the Catholic church to fund things that violate our religious beliefs.
2. The unemployment rate is higher than ever.
3. More people are on welfare and food stamps because Obama cannot produce as a president.
4. Homelessness is at an all time high level, and a vast majority are families with little children.
5. More middle class families are struggling under his presidency.

Obama reminds me of Fidel Castro. He lives like a king, feasts like a king ----- as do all his pals, and then he tells the masses that it is all the ‘capitalists’ fault that the masses have to live a life of suffering…He says this while he feasts on caviar and a sumptuous banquet of food with his pals.

Obama and his pals sleep on a cushy bed at night, and millions of families are worse off, many families living in shelters with their babies because of his inability to effectively do his job.

Obama’s blaming his predecessor is like Bernie Madoff blaming someone else for Bernie Madoff’s actions. Obama has ransacked our countries financial stability by incurring an oppressive deficit and has sold OUR children’s future down the river with his policies and arrogance.

Obama has violated our Constitutional right to practice our religion by stabbing the church in the back and forcing her to fund abortions and all things against our faith.

There are more reasons why I won’t vote for this incompetent and arrogant president. He has failed to even make a substantial dent in this miserable economy, and has instead increased the misery of millions.

BTW, the bulk of the increased jobs in the auto industry went overseas, those jobs did NOT go into OUR economy.

 

[ishii]

Which only proves what we’ve been saying all along. That 2/3 to 3/4 of posters here are Republican or vote that way. I doubt if many of my comrades are all that surprised. I know I’m not.

30 - one for every piece of silver. You forgot about that part - Cmatt. Jesus was betrayed . And He is betrayed by those who vote for a candidate who is opposed to Christian values. .

Ishii

 

[Elizabeth502]

I don’t know why some can’t cool down the rhetoric a bit. It is not really believable that either Obama or Romney is as one-sidedly evil as some make either out to be.

While it is true that the economy continues to be ailing, the reasons for that are complex, relating much more to the the implosion of various traditional structures which formerly held it up – not all of which were healthy, by the way. IOW, Obama is hardly singlehandedly responsible for initiating a great economic decline. He is presiding over one. The long-standing trend toward outsourcing in business, the dominant influence of the stock market (especially since the '90’s) in shaping business decisions based on short-term extreme profit margins over long-term prudence, the radical abandonment of employer loyalty to employee, the relatively rapid shift toward a service economy with insufficient transition for that, as well as all kinds of complex global economic factors – these are only a few of the factors contributing to an unhealthy economy by standards the U.S. used to define as healthy.

Will economists and historians one day refer to him as a great economic leader? Probaby not. His personal agendas (which are mostly fixed on social issues) color his capacity to prioritize the economy in favor of populist trends and issues – and possibly due to his preference for being liked, although that is only inferred from externals. I suspect that the real reaason is simply insufficient background in economics while resorting to areas in which he has greater comfort.

Nevertheless, he does not have a lot of solitary power to effect massive change with regard to the longer paragraph above. Lots of companies, agencies, legislative bodies, and persons are responsible for getting us here, and for merely accepting a fait accomplit. He also accepts the situation, which makes him no better (and I agree not much of a leader.)

He is also no saint. He is by no means any “social justice” candidate. Ridgerunner and others have accurately analyzed the economics of Obama’s policies, many of which bring shameful injustice to the poor which cannot be reconciled honestly with Catholic social doctrine.

Similarly, Romney is no savior, for the simple reason that a Romney presidency is a theoretical. He may or may not improve the U.S. economy (may or may not provide leadership toward that). Alternatively, he is also no demon.

I will be voting based on positions which the two candidates have clearly already articulated, not based on what I assume, positively or negatively, about their personalities, their private motivations, or their spiritual state.

 

[acarlson]

Catholic teaching says not to vote for those that support intrinsic evils such as homosexual marriage, abortion and embryonic stem cell research. Obama supports all of the above and he supports the religious liberty infringing HHS mandate which has 29 lawsuits, many from the Catholic dioceses and institutions. Bishops have also spoken of the problems with the Obama health care law which has lack of conscience protection and allows federal funds to pay for abortion among other issues

I’m voting for Romney because I cannot ethically vote for Obama, and because he is the only real, viable option for defeating Obama in the election due to Obama’s massive breaches listed above. Even though, on other issues, I generally agree with the Democrats more.

 

[_Abyssinia]

I’m voting for Romney because I cannot ethically vote for Obama, and because he is the only real, viable option for defeating Obama in the election due to Obama’s massive breaches listed above. Even though, on other issues, I generally agree with the Democrats more.

Good for you for putting Catholic teaching before partisanship

 

[Scott_Lafrance]

Why do you tie this with taxes and Govt programs? It’s not christian to continue programs that are broken, that don’t work. Being a christian requires exercising free will, it requires making the decision to tithe to the church and your local charities. It requires personal involvement.

Voting that the 1% should pay for your belief of govt charity is just wrong, and no way Christian. The good samaritan provided first person help, he didn’t call in someone else to do his charity work.

“And then along came a Samaritan, who saw the beaten man and was moved with pity. So he contacted the local publican and told him to petition Pilot and Caesar to send a prefect and some legionaries to help the man…”

 

[travelann13]

These are all interpretations that are not brought forth by the USCCB and Cardinal Ratzinger for the obvious reason of letting the voter’s conscience decide (the Pope John Paul II quote is out of place here, since it does not directly touch on the issue of proportionate reasons). Anyway, let’s go with Bishop Galante:

Rather, for there to be proportionate reasons, the voter would have to be convinced that the candidate who supports abortion rights would actually do more than the opposing candidate to limit the harm of abortion or to reduce the number of abortions.

As I have already outlined, I believe that this would be the case in an Obama vs. Romney Presidency, since in my view Romney’s policies would provoke economic downward pressure that in turn would provoke more abortions. You may disagree with my political view, but that is not the point. The point is that this legitimate political view of mine is morally allowed to influence the choice of my personal conscience.

Are you certain we aren’t in that “economic downward pressure”? the-american-catholic.com/2012/09/27/recession-here-we-come/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AmericanCatholic+%28The+American+Catholic%29

 

[Seeker1961]

Why do you tie this with taxes and Govt programs? It’s not christian to continue programs that are broken, that don’t work. Being a christian requires exercising free will, it requires making the decision to tithe to the church and your local charities. It requires personal involvement.

Voting that the 1% should pay for your belief of govt charity is just wrong, and no way Christian. The good samaritan provided first person help, he didn’t call in someone else to do his charity work.

That is your opinion, based on your experiences and understanding. I’m not asking you to change it, I’m sharing mine.

I agree with Stephen Colbert that there is are a large group of people in America who profess that this is a “Christian nation” while continuing to look upon their less fortunate brothers and sisters as lazy and unworthy of even the smallest amount of assistance. At the same time, those same people continue to believe that mega-corporations and wealthy people deserve to pay less and less for the benefits they receive from being in this country.

Based on my experiences, charity is not enough and cannot do everything to ensure a healthy and well educated population. Christians do not ALL tithe, and polls show that Catholics tithe far less than their other Christian brethren. Perhaps if EVERY Christian did tithe we would get closer to a country where charity could do more, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon.

 

[Seeker1961]

I cannot disagree more with such sweeping (and in my opinion, condemning as well) statements. If you feel that way about yourself (and I hope you do not), you are not in a position to know whether others do or do not try to employ some objectivity in making voting decisions. I posted about that earlier, on this or another thread. I was raised to consider good citizenship to include the consideration of needs beyond my own and beyond my “opinions.” Rather, I was raised to become educated about all the facts prior to voting on whatever issues were current, and to consider the effect on society, of my votes, not just the effects on myself. I was raised not to use emotional judgment about issues on which I was submitting a vote in an election. I was not raised to use “selective evidence,” as you put it. That’s a pretty cynical view of human nature, i.m.o.

That is, it is not that some people do not do that. I’m sure many do. But to say that “all of us do” and “in all aspects of life” is something else entirely.

I have often voted against my own narrow interests, in favor of the wider good for society. I have done so painfully at times. (Including taxing myself for a civic good, sometimes when I did not directly benefit from that good.) I don’t consider myself some heroine for doing so, because I know for a fact that many others do so as well. I consider that responsible citizenship.

And I consider responsible Catholicism to include not distorting statements of current and former popes, bishops, and cardinals in an effort to rationalize voting decisions which clearly miss the moral mark in core Catholic teachings. And that has included having to struggle with discomforting statements from the hierarchy, before most elections. Again, I am hardly alone in this. Many people seek out truth non-selectively.

It is true that we cannot entirely clear our subjectivity from our perception, but that is not the same thing as suggesting that no one seeks truth apart from what comforts themselves, pleases themselves, or serves themselves. Many do, certainly not “all.”

I am aware that it is more comfortable for me to be around with people who believe as I do. I understand my own tendency to feel positive about opinions that agree with the ones I have already formed. I’m here, so it’s obvious that I don’t spend my entire life in a bubble, but I’m not arrogant enough to believe that I’m totally objective.

However, I did commit the unpardonable sin of not using the word “many”…I have been duly corrected.

 

[Lord_Servant]

I will not be voting. I’ll be praying instead.

Hi Robert,
I understand your decision but i think it is your right to vote ,even though both candidate are proclaiming evil things like abortion ,i think you need to choose the one who will do less evil because if you dont vote may be it will even be more worst in the future to come while may be by God grace if choosing the one who promises less evil in the future to come things can change.

But after every things just do what the Holy Spirit tells you to do

 

[Al_Moritz]

That is your opinion, based on your experiences and understanding. I’m not asking you to change it, I’m sharing mine.

I agree with Stephen Colbert that there is are a large group of people in America who profess that this is a “Christian nation” while continuing to look upon their less fortunate brothers and sisters as lazy and unworthy of even the smallest amount of assistance. At the same time, those same people continue to believe that mega-corporations and wealthy people deserve to pay less and less for the benefits they receive from being in this country.

Based on my experiences, charity is not enough and cannot do everything to ensure a healthy and well educated population. Christians do not ALL tithe, and polls show that Catholics tithe far less than their other Christian brethren. Perhaps if EVERY Christian did tithe we would get closer to a country where charity could do more, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon.

Precisely. The tax vs. charity argument is another questionable argument. I believe that for a large part it is supported unthinkingly by conservative Christians to justify any corrupt, corporatist, inhuman and unjust stance that the Republican party stands for, just because it is the “pro-life party”. Talk about contortionist mental gymnastics.

I support the subsidiarity principle of the Catholic Church. Yet too often it seems degraded into, and misused as, cheap political argument.

 

[Carlan]

That is your opinion, based on your experiences and understanding. I’m not asking you to change it, I’m sharing mine.

I agree with Stephen Colbert that there is are a large group of people in America who profess that this is a “Christian nation” while continuing to look upon their less fortunate brothers and sisters as lazy and unworthy of even the smallest amount of assistance. At the same time, those same people continue to believe that mega-corporations and wealthy people deserve to pay less and less for the benefits they receive from being in this country.

Based on my experiences, charity is not enough and cannot do everything to ensure a healthy and well educated population. Christians do not ALL tithe, and polls show that Catholics tithe far less than their other Christian brethren. Perhaps if EVERY Christian did tithe we would get closer to a country where charity could do more, but I don’t see that happening anytime soon

And I am just thinking…
Wonder how many of the Catholic republicans who voted in the above poll actually tithe to charity through their Parish Church or in other ways besides the taxes they pay, which they begrudge so strongly.
Peace, Carlan

 

[rlg94086]

And I am just thinking…
Wonder how many of the Catholic republicans who voted in the above poll actually tithe to charity through their Parish Church or in other ways besides the taxes they pay, which they begrudge so strongly.
Peace, Carlan

Of course you were thinking that. Why wouldn’t you?

 

[rlg94086]

Precisely. The tax vs. charity argument is another questionable argument. I believe that for a large part it is supported unthinkingly by conservative Christians to justify any corrupt, corporatist, inhuman and unjust stance that the Republican party stands for, just because it is the “pro-life party”. Talk about contortionist mental gymnastics.

I support the subsidiarity principle of the Catholic Church. Yet too often it seems degraded into, and misused as, cheap political argument.

Nice. You and Carlan think well of others…especially, when you are justifying a vote for a pro-choice, pro-“gay marriage” candidate in favor of bloated, bureaucratic government programs.

 

[He_Man]

Nice. You and Carlan think well of others…

I still don’t get the logic of Obama supporters. He may well win, or Romney could. If he was bill Clinton, and the economy was booming like the late nineties (even with Congress’s help) I could see the logic, even though I vehemently disagree about the importance of certain issues. But it isn’t. He is against Catholic social teaching on major issues, and simply has not helped the poor at all.

But what do Obama voters expect to be different in the next four years. We’ve had record unemployment, and more poor than ever before. We’ve increased our debt, and the deficit as well.

No one sees these things as good obviously, but I’d love to hear whether Obama voters believe these will get better in another four years? if so, how?

 

[Elizabeth502]

I agree with Stephen Colbert that there is are a large group of people in America who profess that this is a “Christian nation” while continuing to look upon their less fortunate brothers and sisters as lazy and unworthy of even the smallest amount of assistance. At the same time, those same people continue to believe that mega-corporations and wealthy people deserve to pay less and less for the benefits they receive from being in this country.

And there is a large group of people who believes none of that, who believes that government does have some role, and a signfiicant role in charity, but neither the overwhelming role nor all of the specifics currently in place, let alone proposed as expansions. Many of that “large group” does not fit into a caricature such as Stephen Colbert is accustomed to doing, given that he is a caricaturist by profession. Many in that group are far more thoughtful, conscientious, ***and charitable ***than many people on this thread are prepared to give them credit for.

It is not charity to stereotype, marginalize, and dismiss one’s fellow anonymous citizens, while claiming that one’s own voting decisions demonstrate “greater charity.” I’m not sure where Stephen Colbert derives his assumptions, but it would not appear that his opnion of a simplistically binary American public can be verfied with fact.

 

[Carlan]

I still don’t get the logic of Obama supporters. He may well win, or Romney could. If he was bill Clinton, and the economy was booming like the late nineties (even with Congress’s help) I could see the logic, even though I vehemently disagree about the importance of certain issues. But it isn’t. He is against Catholic social teaching on major issues, and simply has not helped the poor at all.

But what do Obama voters expect to be different in the next four years. We’ve had record unemployment, and more poor than ever before. We’ve increased our debt, and the deficit as well

To get over the debacle of fighting two wars on credit,The lost emplyment of the Bush years will likely take at least the next twelve years for recovery. I hope Obama is able to continue on with his policies for another four years followed up by a Hillary Clinton with another eight.
Unemployment has had a marked improvement in the past two years and it is still moving forward in spite of what you want to believe. Peace, Carlan

 

[Carlan]

Nice. You and Carlan think well of others…especially, when you are justifying a vote for a pro-choice, pro-“gay marriage” candidate in favor of bloated, bureaucratic government programs.

Well, what do you think? Do you believe all Republican minded Catholics contribute to 10-% of their bottom line in support of those less fortunate? or even 5 %.?
I notice there were no comments about all the generous giving to personal charity to help the needs of the less fortunate in our country, Or are you of the mind that," by God I pulled myself up by my boot straps, let the rest you bums do the same", You know , the 47%!. Where is the compassion in the the far right GOP position. Show me RLG! Peace, Carlan

 

[Carlan]

Precisely. The tax vs. charity argument is another questionable argument. I believe that for a large part it is supported unthinkingly by conservative Christians to justify any corrupt, corporatist, inhuman and unjust stance that the Republican party stands for, just because it is the “pro-life party”. Talk about contortionist mental gymnastics.

I support the subsidiarity principle of the Catholic Church. Yet too often it seems degraded into, and misused as, cheap political argument

Boy,are you ever right on! Peace, Carlan

 

[Seeker1961]

And there is a large group of people who believes none of that, who believes that government does have some role, and a signfiicant role in charity, but neither the overwhelming role nor all of the specifics currently in place, let alone proposed as expansions. Many of that “large group” does not fit into a caricature such as Stephen Colbert is accustomed to doing, given that he is a caricaturist by profession. Many in that group are far more thoughtful, conscientious, ***and charitable ***than many people on this thread are prepared to give them credit for.

It is not charity to stereotype, marginalize, and dismiss one’s fellow anonymous citizens, while claiming that one’s own voting decisions demonstrate “greater charity.” I’m not sure where Stephen Colbert derives his assumptions, but it would not appear that his opnion of a simplistically binary American public can be verfied with fact.

Before you accuse me of stereotyping, marginalizing and dismissing others, perhaps you should re-read the political threads on this site and see how anyone who dares to disagree with the majority opinion is described.

I have stated my opinion. I have not asked that anyone else agree, although I do admit to being surprised by the defensiveness of the responses.