How different are McCain and Hillary?

Would a Hillary presidency be substantially different from a McCain White House?

Will she succeed in bringing health care to the uninsured? She didn’t the first time she tried. The bumbling Clinton administration set back the cause of universal coverage by a generation.

Will she reign in the power of the presidency and roll back the unconstitutional pattern of behavior blazed by the Bush administration? This is not a cause that I have heard her take up. Her inability to take a stand against torture is an implicit endorsement of its use. In this area, I think McCain may scratch my anti-torture itch more effectively than Clinton.

Will she take up the cause of the poor and fight poverty? Welfare reform under Clinton the 1st was a pure capitulation to Republican interests after taking a beating in 1994.

Will gay and lesbian Americans be made whole citizens under the law under Clinton the 2nd? “Don’t ask, don’t tell” is a politician’s answer to a moral question.

We support Obama because he will change America and Americans for the better. For Barack, becoming President is a means to an end. The end we seek is a better nation.

Winning the White House as an end in itself, exclusively for the sake of beating the Republican party, is insufficient. Winning without conscience is losing.