Ask either presidential candidate what’s at stake in this election and he’ll assure you that it’s the most consequential contest of our lifetime.
They would also agree that the election is not a referendum on President Obama but a choice — a “very dramatic choice,” as Mitt Romney told a crowd in Westerville, Ohio, on Wednesday — between two very different governing visions. That choice is all the more important because so many formidable problems await the next president: how to reduce the deficit, reform the tax code, and curb the growth of entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security, to name just a few. With so much on the line, you might naturally want to know more about these competing visions. Here again the candidates would agree. They’d say, “We’ll get back to you.”
Comments
Citizens United made a nearly impossible situation truly impossible. We were close to world in which fund-raising and campaigning were full-time jobs of elected officials, and now we are truly in one. There will be no political courage until we stop equating money with speech.
Read something besides the Globe once in a while kate2468. Citizens United lets unions and corporations spend money on political advertisements - the very thing the Founding Fathers wanted to protect against people like you.
This has nothing to do with Romney and Obama (and most candidates for that matter) avoiding questions.
It's up to us as voters to reward candidates who tell the truth by voting for them.
It's a difficult time to govern. Our economy, and that of the entire world is going through some major shifts. International trade, the rise of multinational corporations, all of the associated outsourcing, the predictable rise in religious fundamentalism and the separation of the haves from the have-nots are all making leadership a very precarious and multi-skilled job. Joshua, don't be naive. Politicians are salesmen but especially in today's political climate. And that includes Obama. It's also why Romney has any chance in this election at all. He was a great salesman, which of course means the buyer beware! But he's a one issue guy. And he's wrong on that one issue. He'll fix the economy, yeah right! What Romney is selling is a load of garbage. The vacuum-up-and-horde-it-all-for-myself-economy. He doesn't care about people. That's his fundamental problem, he just doesn't give a damn about anyone outside of his limited scope of vision and it shows, Holy Cow does it ever show. Don't lament transparency, there is plenty of information before us now. Obama is obviously the better choice.
I would say the vagueness of the candidates speaks more to the immaturity of the American public than it does to the candidates.