My vote... I want it to count!

We are standing on the edge of a very historical presidential election, no matter where the vote lands. And as such is about to happen, the last thing I want to do is cast my vote without learning what I need and should know first.

Making that decision, to do my homework to learn where each candidate lays on each issues, I have decided that I'm going to ignore the pundants, ignore the idle office chatter, and I certainly will not be paying attention to the media. I'm going straight to the source and want to know what each party has to say.

I have always been a Democrat to the core, much to dismay of MANY of my closest friends, and especially to my family, however, I find myself standing on a fence right now, unsure of which side I want to step down on. That's why I MUST, as a registered AMERICAN voter, find the truth and figure where I lay my ballot down.

The one thing I have constantly on my mind is that words really don't mean much. It's the actions that speak so much louder. Any candidate can SAY he's going to do this, or do that, or not do this or that, but what it REALLY comes down to, is how they hold up to those words. Either candidate can SAY they are going to end the war in Iraq, bring the troops home, but without all of the intelligence, without all of the information, without any of it, they can talk until they are blue in the face, because they simply don't have ALL of the facts! And that's something they will NOT have until they are sworn into office.

On a side note here: In my opinion, which is simply mine, and I have an American given right to not only have my opinion, but also to publish, verbalize, and SPEAK it as well, and I feel we never should have gone into Iraq. There was no reason for us to go there. Afghanistan is where our enemy lies, and where we should have focused our military efforts and attention. It was Osama Bin Laden that attacked the United States in 2001, not Saddam Huessein! It was Al Queda, not the Iraqi military regime that sent those planes hurdling into the twin towers, the pentagon, and that field in Virginia!! Somehow, Bush managed to put up all his smoke screens and divert our attention to Iraq, and next thing you know, we have over 1,000 soldiers dead, countless more injured, and 7 years later how far have we come? Bush has managed to run this country for 8 years, 7 of which we have been at war. And for what end? So we could experience a modern day Vietnam? A modern day Korea? And we're still NO CLOSER to catching Bin Laden as we were on the day those planes and those two towers went down on American soil!

Something that not many people know about me is that I have far more friends and family members that are actively in the military than any one person I know. More than half of those people are currently deployed in either Iraq or Afghanistan. I have spoken at great lengths with many of these soldiers, in just about every conceivable rank from simple airman to top-secret high ranked naval "spooks", about their opinions on what is going on. I have to say that honestly, just like our country, it's pretty divided as to how they feel. Half of them believe in the fight and think we are doing the right thing, half of them think this is useless and we shouldn't be there. There is no ONE person that can speak for the entire military, not even the majority of the military personel, because just like this country, it is vastly diversified and opinions vary greatly from one person to the next. So for any single person to say that the military personel feel this way or that way about the subject, it just seems so biased to me. In psychology, it's called "projecting".

I vow that this weekend, and over the course of the next 7 weeks, I will fully do MY homework and base my decision solely on the FACTS. And no matter who I decide to vote for, I should NOT be shunned, disregarded, or put down. THAT behavior simply goes against every single thing this great country was founded on, and goes against damn near everything that those countless soldiers are fighting to protect.

So please, when you're getting into the heated debates of politics, keep in mind that you have your right to have and protect your opinion, but so does the person you are debating with. It's THEIR right, just as much as it is yours, and no ONE PERSON in American is stupid, dumb, or ignorant for having such opinions. Not any more stupid, dumb, or ignorant than you are.