obama is more than talk.

here is some real information on what obama says and does, since it is popular to accuse him of being full of rhetoric and short on "solutions".  


his religion: "My father, who returned to Kenya when I was just two, was born Muslim but as an adult became an atheist. My mother, whose parents were non-practicing Baptists and Methodists, was probably one of the most spiritual and kindest people I've ever known, but grew up with a healthy skepticism of organized religion herself. As a consequence, so did I.
It wasn't until after college, when I went to Chicago to work as a community organizer for a group of Christian churches, that I confronted my own spiritual dilemma.
I was working with churches, and the Christians who I worked with recognized themselves in me. They saw that I knew their Book and that I shared their values and sang their songs. But they sensed that a part of me that remained removed, detached, that I was an observer in their midst.
And in time, I came to realize that something was missing as well -- that without a vessel for my beliefs, without a commitment to a particular community of faith, at some level I would always remain apart, and alone.
But as the months passed in Chicago, I found myself drawn - not just to work with the church, but to be in the church.
For one thing, I believed and still believe in the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change, a power made real by some of the leaders here today. Because of its past, the black church understands in an intimate way the Biblical call to feed the hungry and cloth the naked and challenge powers and principalities. And in its historical struggles for freedom and the rights of man, I was able to see faith as more than just a comfort to the weary or a hedge against death, but rather as an active, palpable agent in the world. As a source of hope."

 his philosophy
"I think actions do speak louder than words, which is why over the 20 years of my public service I have acted a lot to provide health care to people who didn't have it, to provide tax breaks to families that needed it, to reform a criminal justice system that had resulted in wrongful convictions, to open up our government and to pass the toughest ethics reform legislation since Watergate, to make sure that we create transparency in our government so that we know where federal spending is going and it's not going to a bunch of boondoggles and earmarks that are wasting taxpayer money that could be spent on things like early childhood education.
Senator Clinton and I share a lot of policy positions. But if we can't inspire the American people to get involved in their government and if we can't inspire them to go beyond the racial divisions and the religious divisions and the regional divisions that have plagued our politics for so long, then we will continue to see the kind of gridlock and nonperformance in Washington that is resulting in families suffering in very real ways.
I'm running for president to start doing something about that suffering, and so are the people who are behind my campaign."



 on faith: None of the candidates offered answers that strayed far fromDemocratic Party orthodoxy, but their openness in discussing their faith was unusual. Clinton and Edwards said they pray daily. Clinton described herself as a "praying person." The questions were not the same for each candidate, and Obama, who of the three has spoken the most about his faith in campaign appearances,discussed his belief that evil exists in the world and said "there is a moral element" to his view that pay for corporate chief executives has become excessive. He repeatedly invoked the biblical phrase "I am my brother's keeper." - Wash. Post

on the economy: "Number one, with our tax code: We've got to stop giving tax breaks to companies that are shipping jobs overseas and invest those tax breaks in companies that are investing here in the United States of America. We have to end the Bush tax cuts to the wealthy and to provide tax breaks to middle-class Americans and working Americans who need them. So I've said that if you are making $75,000 a year or less, I want to give an offset to your payroll tax that will mean $1,000 extra in the pockets of ordinary Americans. Senior citizens making less than $50,000, you shouldn't have to pay income tax on your Social Security.
We pay for these by closing tax loopholes and tax havens that are being manipulated.
So these are all issues that I've talked about repeatedly, and I think there are also opportunities in our economy around creating a green economy. We send $1 billion to foreign countries every day because of our addiction to foreign oil. And for us to move rapidly to cap greenhouse gases, generate billions of dollars that we can reinvest in solar and wind and biodiesel -- that can put people back to work. So...
The question people are going to have to ask is: How do we get it done?
And it is my strong belief that the changes are only going to come about if we're able to form a working coalition for change. Because people who were benefiting from the current tax code are going to resist. The special interests and lobbyists are going to resist.And I think it has to be a priority for whoever the next president is to be able to overcome the dominance of the special interests in Washington, to bring about the kinds of economic changes that I'm talking about."

on health care : "We both -- 95 percent of our plans are similar. We both want to set up a system in which any person is going to be able to get coverage that is as good as we have as members of Congress. And we are going to subsidize those who can't afford it. We're going to make sure that we reduce costs by emphasizing prevention. And I want to make sure that we're applying technology to improve quality, cut bureaucracy.
Now, I also want to make sure that we're reducing costs for those who already have health insurance. So we put in place a catastrophic reinsurance plan that would reduce costs by $2,500 per family per year.
So we've got a lot of similarities in our plan. Senator Clinton believes the only way to achieve universal health care is to force everybody to purchase it.And my belief is, the reason that people don't have it is not because they don't want it but because they can't afford it.And so I emphasize reducing costs. And as has been noted by many observers, including Bill Clinton's former secretary of labor, my plan does more than anybody to reduce costs, and there is nobody out there who wants health insurance who can't have it.
One last point I want to make on the health care front. I admire the fact that Senator Clinton tried to bring about health care reform back in 1993. She deserves credit for that.But I said before, I think she did it in the wrong way, because it wasn't just the fact that the insurance companies, the drug companies were battling here, and no doubt they were. It was also that Senator Clinton and the administration went behind closed doors, excluded the participation even of Democratic members of Congress who had slightly different ideas than the ones that Senator Clinton had put forward.And, as a consequence, it was much more difficult to get Congress to cooperate.
The point is this, you know, we can have great plans, but if we don't change how the politics is working in Washington, then neither of our plans are going to happen, and we're going to be four years from now debating once again how we're going to bring universal health care to this country."

Obama's plan for health care:
• Guaranteed Eligibility: No American will be turned away FROM ANY INSURANCE
PLAN because of illness or pre-existing conditions.
• Comprehensive Benefits: The benefit package will be similar to that offered through Federal
Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP), the plan members of Congress have. The plan
will cover all essential medical services, including preventive, maternity and mental health care.
• Affordable Premiums, Co-Pays and Deductibles.
• Subsidies: Individuals and families who do not qualify for Medicaid or SCHIP but still need
financial assistance will receive an income-related federal subsidy to buy into the new public
plan or purchase a private health care plan.
• Simplified Paperwork and Reined in Health Costs.
• Easy Enrollment: The new public plan will be simple to enroll in and provide ready access to
coverage.
• Portability and Choice: Participants in the new public plan and the National Health
Insurance Exchange (see below) will be able to move from job to job without changing or
jeopardizing their health care coverage.
• Quality and Efficiency: Participating insurance companies in the new public program will
be required to report data to ensure that standards for quality, health information technology
and administration are being met.

on Iran: says he would “engage in aggressive personal diplomacy” with Iran if elected president and would offer economic inducements and a possible promise not to seek “regime change” if Iran stopped meddling in Iraq and cooperated on terrorism and nuclear issues. in general, he advocates "talking" without preconditions with problem countries such as Iran and Cuba, differing significantly from Bush's current approach.

on Iraq: Mr. Obama has also talked about keeping a limited force in Iraq after withdrawing American combat units at the rate of one or two per month. But he insisted in the interview that the mission of his residual force would be more limited than that posited by Mrs. Clinton. He said he would commit to training Iraqi security forces only if the Iraqi government engaged in political reconciliation and did not employ the Iraqi Army and the police for sectarian purposes. In any event, he said, American trainers would not be attached with Iraqi units that go in harm’s way. Senator Barack Obama said that the United States should shift its military focus away from the Iraq war to a broader fight against Islamic extremism.

on preparedness to govern/war: "I wouldn't be running if I didn't think I was prepared to be commander-in-chief.
My number one job as president will be to keep the American people safe. I will do whatever is required to accomplish that. I will not hesitate to act against those that would do America harm.Now, that involves maintaining the strongest military on earth, which means that we are training our troops properly and equipping them properly, and putting them on proper rotations. And there are an awful lot of families here in Texas who have been burdened under two and three and four tours because of the poor planning of the current commander-in-chief, and that will end when I am president.
But it also means using our military wisely. And on what I believe was the single most important foreign policy decision of this generation, whether or not to go to war in Iraq, I believe I showed the judgment of a commander in chief. And I think that Senator Clinton was wrong in her judgments on that. Now, that has consequences -- that has significant consequences, because it has diverted attention from Afghanistan where al Qaeda, that killed 3,000 Americans, are stronger now than at any time since 2001.
You know, I've heard from an Army captain who was the head of a rifle platoon -- supposed to have 39 men in a rifle platoon. Ended up being sent to Afghanistan with 24 because 15 of those soldiers had been sent to Iraq. And as a consequence, they didn't have enough ammunition, they didn't have enough humvees. They were actually capturing Taliban weapons, because it was easier to get Taliban weapons than it was for them to get properly equipped by our current commander in chief.
Now, that's a consequence of bad judgment. And you know, the question is, on the critical issues that we face right now, who's going to show the judgment to lead? And I think that on every critical issue that we've seen in foreign policy over the last several years -- going into Iraq originally, I didn't just oppose it for the sake of opposing it.
I said this is going to distract us from Afghanistan; this is going to fan the flames of anti-American sentiment; it's going to cost us billions of dollars and thousands of lives and overstretch our military. And I was right.
On the issues that have come up that a commander in chief is going to have to make decisions on, I have shown the judgment to lead. That is the leadership that I want to show when I'm president of the United States."

Obama released his earmarks to the public; hillary won't.

Obama wants to cut emissions 80% by 2050...and in my opinion, it seems that having the goal may be enough to get us there (vs having no plan at all) He believes in investing money into this effort, which will pay back so much in the long run.

above information is from various debates and news articles.


oh, and his life story
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2007/12/29/us/politics/20071229_OBAMA_TIMELINE.html

and his stances
http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/ObamaBlueprintForChange.pdf

and more on his views on faith:
http://www.barackobama.com/pdf/ObamaonFaith.pdf
http://www.barackobama.com/2006/06/28/call_to_renewal_keynote_address.php

and an article from the london guardian that breaks things down w/o partiality
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jan/22/hillaryclinton.barackobama

that's it for now.

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baby!

i am a mother now.
baby buckley was born january 21, 2008. she's doing great...developing right on schedule, it seems. At least, she keeps getting cuter and cuter.

her favorite things include: shocking visitors with loud bowel movements, ceiling fans, starring in films, band of horses, barack obama, listening to her mom pronounce monosyllabic words, and, of course, milk.

baby - husband = hard...but we're making it. chip is out on the road, so buckley and i have been kicking it alone for about half of her life.
if you want to hear what he's doing, leaving his family behind and such, visit him (and a few friends) here.

it's funny how time flies with a baby.
my days are filled with reading, cooking, feeding, sleeping, and walking. there is beauty in this repetition, although perhaps it's a little hard to find every now and then.

yummy updates soon on blankpalate.

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