Why vote?

It seems that many people are "donating their statuses" and blog entries to voting, so I thought, why not me too? That's for the blog post, not the facebook status. I should warn that this entire post is coming from someone who is very right-wing. While I am willing to listen to the opinions of others, I am not inviting an argument here. This is my blog, and I will post my personal opinions freely. You can post yours on your own blog. ;o)


Anyway, I keep hearing a lot from people who thinks that Christians only vote one way because of abortion, or about the Christians who are going against the "mainstream" Christianity and voting on social issues...voting their "conscience." Well, being a Christian, I would like to defend myself and my reasons for voting the way that I do.

Neither of the candidates running for this election are people who I actually like or want to see running this country. However, because I feel that it is my duty as an American (and because I LOVE voting, as I've blogged about before :-p), I have made a choice and will vote for that person for the following reasons.

Yes, I feel that abortion is a huge issue. Are there other more important things going on right now? Some people say yes, but I'm not so sure. The democratic candidate stated that "Nobody likes abortion." I do hope this is the case. A lot of people feel, including that democratic candidate, that regardless of how horrible abortion may be, overturning Roe vs. Wade is not the answer. Instead, they need to educate and provide services and family planning to people, because it's people who live in economic hardships who get abortions the most. Ok, this might be true. We do need a lot more education and family planning. We need abstinence initiatives in schools. I wish that people like Pam Stenzel could go into every Middle & High School in America and speak. DESPITE ALL OF THAT, I 100% believe that abortion is wrong. I 100% believe that nobody has the right to choose to kill a baby inside of them, whether it's their body or not. Are their grey areas where mothers might be taking a fatal risk by carrying their baby to term? Yes. However, those cases are few and far between. The fact that thousands of unborn babies are killed every week is so very sad. Of course people bring up the "How can you be against abortion and support war?" question. My answer is this. While I wish we had no war, and it's HORRIBLE when civilians particularly are killed, I believe that wars are fought for a reason. Our soldiers fight to protect our country, to protect our property and assets (and yes, I know oil is one of those assets), and to further DEMOCRACY in this world. Is it right that people lose their lives because of war? No. However, is war necessary? Absolutely. Is abortion? Absolutely not.

When thousands of babies are dieing weekly (even daily), I'd say it's a pretty huge issue. However, that is not the ONLY reason I will vote for the candidate I plan to vote for. Piggybacking on the abortion is stem-cell research, both of which can fall under the Sanctity of Life umbrella. Life is precious. No one should be able to take a life away-not for war, not by abortion, murder, for scientific research (I believe that stem-cell research should be done, but with adult stem cells, and not embryos), etc. Now, lets move on to the topic of gay marriage and shove that under the same umbrella (because I do believe that it belongs there). I am not homophobic. I do not hate gay people. In fact, some of my very best friends are homosexual. And, I love them very much. Do I agree with their lifestyle? Absolutely not. Do I love them anyway? Absolutely! How can you not love a person just because of the sin in their life? I love a lot of sinners. In fact, I don't love anyone who is not a sinner (besides Jesus of course :o)). Anyway, I truly, truly, truly believe that the sanctity of marriage is so important. I believe that God meant for a man and woman to be joined as one. God is not for homosexuality. However, he is for marriage. Marriage should be a protected holy union. I fully believe that one of the greatest break-downs of this country is due to the breakdown of the nuclear family and the sanctity of marriage. I am against gay marriage. Would I support civil unions and same-sex couples receiving tax breaks and joint health insurance, etc.? I would support that if the same were granted to my best friend and I if we were unmarried, yet chose to be roommates and share a household. Obviously in no way would we be in a committed romantic relationship, but if we committed to live together because we were both unmarried, for the purpose of sharing expenses, and it was a long-term commitment, then we should be afforded the same options.

Moving on, I am going to jump back a bit to the abortion issue, but this time in terms of Supreme Court Judicial nominations. The next president will have the honor of nominating new justices for the Supreme Court. Depending on who fills those positions will depend on whether or not Roe vs. Wade is overturned. This is obviously important to me. I was very alarmed however, when I heard an interview recently between a television journalist and the democratic candidate. The candidate was asked if they would nominate a judge who firmly holds to the Constitution, and in a round-about way, that candidate said no. He wants the Constitution to be stretched in a way that would support the Marxist ideology of the redistribution of wealth. I have always been against socialism. I am a staunch capitalist. I do believe that our capitalist system has enumerable flaws. I do not believe that the answer to our problems, however, is to "tax the rich," which will not amount to enough money to give the tax breaks that this candidate is talking about. "Tax the rich" is going to turn into "tax everyone who isn't already on welfare" and then expand the welfare system to include everyone! I know that I'm being extreme, but I already pay a ridiculous amount of taxes. I have no doubt that my taxes will go up regardless of who is put in office. I believe that the redistribution of wealth is not the answer though. Especially when (even though he says it's not true) my bank account is going to hurt even more than it does now.

I'm going on and on and I'm suddenly tired of writing anymore. I just feel very strongly about holding to the constitution and keeping people's freedoms in tact. I should have a right to spend my money the way I want to. I am not a Libertarian. I don't believe that there should be no taxes. In fact, I don't mind paying taxes. I don't think the answer is to create additional taxes though. I don't think the answer is to have more federal government control than we have now. More power should be given to state governments.

Why do I support one candidate above the other? I am anti-abortion. I am pro-life. I am pro-marriage. I am pro-stem-cell research on adult stem-cells. I am a Capitalist. I am pro-liberty. I am pro-spending my own money and not having state-mandated programs. I am anti-welfare. I am pro-guns (I support the right to bear arms). I am pro-capital punishment. I am pro-freedom of speech. I am pro-Democracy. I 100% support the Constitution of the United States of America. And yes, I have read it.

For me, it comes down to ideologies. I know that I only touched on a few areas. I left out so many other issues, and there is so much gray area, especially when it comes to provisioning for the poor. I think that more state aid should be given to religious and private organizations and they should be the ones to take care of the poor. Like I said, I really don't like either candidate. However, I must vote. I will be voting my conscience, my morals, my values, and my ideologies. Maybe I sound like your typical conservative Christian, but I am making an educated decision. I've watched a million interviews, the various debates, and read umpteen articles. I do not only vote my party line. I have voted for the opposite party before. I will step into that voting booth tomorrow and know that I made the right decision. I'm not telling anyone else what to do. This is my decision...and my blog! :-p



Thanks for reading this. Sorry it was so long and scatter-brained! Hopefully those of you who disagree won't go crazy on me. ;o)