The Repository [Canton, OH]
Sunday, September 28, 2008

For president: Barack Obama

The United States is moving in the wrong direction. That is what the polls say. What do you think? We think that the United States is moving in many wrong directions.

On Main Street, families are watching their homes and retirement savings lose value while the cost of their most basic needs goes up and up. On Wall Street, a hands-off approach to oversight of financial institutions has led to the biggest economic crisis since the Great Depression. Halfway around the world, the United States remains mired in a country it should never have invaded.

Stark Countians rightly want change in Washington. The Repository editorial board believes that the presidential candidate who can deliver on this demand is Democrat Barack Obama.

Sen. Obama's "politics of hope" is a welcome change from Washington's bitter, unproductive business as usual. In these difficult times, Americans need some hope for their future. The rest of the world, watching the weight of war, deep deficits, job losses, a go-it-alone foreign policy and now economic crisis bear down on the United States, needs some reassurance about this country's future.

Some great signal of a new beginning is needed. Obama, far more than his opponent, Republican Sen. John McCain, can send that signal. And then President Obama can get down to business. In addition to wanting to see a new tone in Washington, we have more confidence that an Obama administration can steer the country onto a sounder course than a McCain administration can.

In the realm of foreign policy, Obama said unequivocally in 2002 that a U.S. invasion of Iraq would be a mistake, as The Repository did. It was not a popular conviction, but it was the right one. McCain supported the pre-emptive war, as did the vast majority of Congress.

Now, as the United States labors to extricate our troops, McCain echoes President Bush's aversion to withdrawal timetables, which Iraqi leaders say they want. Obama also wants to set withdrawal deadlines, making his prospects better than McCain's for negotiating a timely U.S. exit.

At home, Obama is much more in tune with the struggles of the middle class, and his tax plan would benefit many more Americans than McCain's proposals would. According to the nonpartisan Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, middle-class families would save about $1,118 a year under Obama's plan, but only $325 under McCain's. Obama's plan also would increase the deficit less than McCain's — $3.5 trillion by 2018, compared to $5 trillion, the center calculates.

Unfortunately, these debt calculations are no longer mind-boggling, as they were before the meltdown on Wall Street. Neither candidate has made deficit reduction as high a priority as he should. But McCain is particularly disappointing.

This is not the John McCain that The Repository endorsed in the 2000 Republican primary over George W. Bush. Then, McCain was unquestionably an independent thinker. We supported him in large part because his spending plan was more conservative than Bush's. The John McCain of 2008 freely admits he has voted with President Bush 90 percent of the time, even to the extent of flip-flopping on the Bush tax cuts he originally opposed as detrimental to the deficit.

The events of the last two weeks have provided another telling contrast between the two candidates. Obama has stressed the need for a bipartisan agreement on a financial bailout and reform package that includes strong accountability measures. McCain has indulged his penchant for drama. He declared that if he were president, he would fire the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission — action that a president doesn't have the authority to take. Then he abruptly refused to debate Obama on Friday — at a time when Americans need to hear directly from both men about their reaction to the financial crisis — but, fortunately, McCain changed his mind again.

We believe that Obama's intellect, caution, levelheadedness and calm demeanor make him better suited to lead a nation that must respond to many unwelcome changes with yet more change. The Repository endorses Sen. Barack Obama for president.

© 2008 The Repository.  All rights reserved.