Election Day

I've probably already beaten the dead voucher horse more than I ever should have, so I'm going to make my election day post a little different (see Alison's post from yesterday if you'd like a bit of a voucher recap). In a nutshell, I look forward to voting for a new President in a year from now (now I didn't say anything about President Bush...). As I've thought about this and tried to learn a bit about the candidates, I've felt a bit overwhelmed because of how many rich folk have decided to try their hand at the Presidency.

I went out searching for websites that would match me up with the candidates whose views most closely match my own. I found a couple of different ones that helped me in this endeavor. All of these sites ask you to rate your opinion on key issues and to also assign an importance to them. Using this information, they attempt to match you up with the candidate whose views are nearest to your own. I would urge any other voter who is unsure, as I was, about who to support to take a look at whose views match your own. You may be surprised...

The first site that I visited was a website for Minnesota's Public Radio. The candidates returned from this site were not too surprising to me. I've always been impressed with Mike Huckabee. He seems to be a good role model for children (and for fat people). I was also not surprised to see Barack Obama and John McCain near the top. I didn't appreciate Tom Tancredo showing up so near to the top though. I think he's a bit of a one-issue nut.
The next site that I visited was vajoe.com. I didn't like the way that they profiled the issues as much but I was looking for a variety of recommendations to look for any consistency. As you can see, my top match was Senator Joseph Biden (but Hillary Clinton and John Edwards were both in the top 4). Once again Mike Huckabee and Barack Obame showed up near the top. I don't want to be a supporter of a candidate because they are the most popular or because they appeal incredibly well to a specific demographic (see Mitt Romney/Mormons).
The last (and probably tied with the MPR site for my favorite) site that I visited was selectsmart.com. The questions on this site were very specific and sometimes a little tougher to answer. Once again, Joseph Biden found himself right near the top of my list. Looks like I'll have to try and learn a bit more about him.
It's too bad that Stephen Colbert wasn't listed as a candidate choice on these websites. I think that we would have been a match made in heaven.

***Sidenote: I went through the belief system selector on selectsmart.com curious to find out what religion they would recommend to me. Imagine my surprise (pleasantly surprised, of course) when I matched up 100% with my own chosen religion. Now for everybody else, this is a good quiz to take to see whether or not you actually know your religion's doctrine (or believe everything that your religion professes to teach). If you do, then you should obviously also get 100% rating with your chosen religion.