McCain Bio-sketch

John Sidney McCain III was born on August 29, 1936 at Coco Solo Navel Air Station in the Panama Canal Zone, Panama. His parents names were John S. McCain Jr. and Roberta Wright McCain. John McCain has Scots-Irish, Anglo-Irish, and English ancestry. He has a older sister Sandy and a younger brother named Joe who his father to various Naval postings in the United States and the Pacific. He graduated from the U.S Naval Academy in 1958. Then he became a naval aviator, flying ground-attack aircraft from aircraft carriers. After retiring from the navy as captain in 1981, he then moved to Arizona and entered politics. When John McCain formally announced his intention to run for President of the United States on April 25, 2007 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, he stated that: “I’m not running for president to be somebody, but to do something; to do the hard but necessary things, not the easy and needless things.” Alaska Governor Sarah Palin was revealed as McCain’s surprise choice for running mate on August 29, 2008. He was only the second presidential nominee to select a woman for running mate and the first republican to do so.

John McCain holds the position of having a strong support for the Iraq War, calling for decisive actions for victory, and strongly supporting the surge. He also supports lowering federal spending and lowering taxes, though he voted against the Bush tax cuts. He will commit our country to expanding domestic oil and natural gas exploration. John McCain believes it is time for the federal government to lift these restrictions and work with states to put our own reserves to use. We have trillions of dollars worth of oil and gas reserves in the U.S. at a time we are exporting hundreds of billions of dollars a year overseas to buy energy. This is the largest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind. He proposes to cooperate with the states and the Department of Defense in the decisions to develop these resources. He will put our country on track to construct 45 new nuclear power plants by 2030 with the ultimate goal of eventually constructing 100 new plants. It is also critical that the U.S. be able to build the components for these plants and reactors within our country so that we are not dependent on foreign suppliers with long wait times to move forward with our nuclear plans.

Palin Bio-Sketch

Sarah Palin was born February 11,1964 and is the governor of Alaska. She is the Republican Party’s vice-presidential candidate for the 2008 United States presidential election with senator John McCain. She was the second woman, and the first Alaskan, to run on the national ticket of either major party. Governor Palin was born in Sandpoint, Idaho and she is the third of four children. When Sarah was very little, not even able to walk, her family and her moved to Alaska. As a child, she sometimes went moose hunting with her father before school. Palin attended Wasilla High School in Wasilla, which was located 44 miles north or the Anchorage. She was the head of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes chapter at the school and the point guard and captain of the school's girls' basketball team that won the Alaska state championship in 1982. Then in 1982, she enrolled at Hawaii Pacific College but left after her first semester. She transferred to North Idaho community college, where she spent two semesters as a general studies major. Sarah Palin was in a lot of beauty pageants. She won the Miss Wasilla Pageant, then finished third in the 1984 Miss Alaska Pageant, at which she won a collage scholarship and the “Miss Congeniality” award. Afterwards, Palin attended the Matanuska-Susitna community college in Alaska for one term. The next year she returned to the University of Idaho where she spent three semesters completing her Bachelor of Science degree in communications-journalism, graduating in 1987.

On August 29, 2008, in Dayton Ohio, Republican presidential candidate John McCain announced that he had chosen Palin as his running mate. Palin has promoted oil and natural gas resource exploration in Alaska, including in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. She brought suit to overturn the listing of polar bears under the federal Endangered Species Act, and also opposed strengthening protections for beluga whales in Alaska’s Cook Inlet. On global warming, Palin said that "A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I'm not one though who would attribute it to being man-made." She later said that "Man's activities certainly can be contributing to the issue" and that "John McCain and I agree that we got to do something about it. "Regarding foreign policy, Palin supports the Bush Administration's policies in Iraq, but is concerned that "dependence on foreign energy" may be obstructing efforts to "have an exit plan in place". Palin supports preemptive military action in the face of an imminent threat, and supports U.S. military operations in Pakistan. She declined to give a yes or no answer regarding whether U.S. military forces should make cross-border attacks into Pakistan without the approval of the Pakistani government.

Obama Bio-sketch

Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii of August of 1961. His fathers from Kenya peand his mother was from Kansas. He was raised by a single mother and his grandparents. In 1958 Barrack graduated from the Naval Academy. He also fought in Vietnam and was awarded many metals. He took out loans to put himself through school. During his years of learning he went to earn his law degree from Harvard in 1991. He then returned to Chicago to practice as a civil rights lawyer and teach constitutional law. His work led him to run for Illinois state senate. He ran as senate for 8 years and then he was first elected to office on November 2, 1982. Democrats chose Barrack Obama as the first ever African-American Presidential Nominee for a political party on August 27, 2008.

Obama believes in a 21st century economic plan to help make sure that America can complete in global economy and make sure the middle class is thriving and increasing. He will expand investments in infrastructure, energy independence, education, and research and development. As Obama being a democratic he believes in pro-choice. He supports legislation to expand access to contraception, health information, and preventative services to help reduce pregnancies that weren’t intended to happen. That is why he co-sponsored the Prevention First Act of 2007, which will bring up funding for family planning and comprehensive sex education that teaches both abstinence and safe sex methods. Obama supports charter schools but he’s skeptical of private schools. He believes that personally, marriage is between man and woman. But equality is a moral imperative for gays and lesbians. He says there shouldn’t be any discrimination against people who choose to be different in any way.

Biden Bio-Sketch

Joe Biden was born on November 20, 1942 and he is the Vice President-elect of the United States and the senior United States Senator from Delaware. Biden was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania and lived there for ten years before moving to Delaware. He is the son of Joseph Robinette Biden Sr. and Catherine Eugenia "Jean" Finnegan. He was the first of four siblings in an Irish Catholic family. He has two brothers, James Brian Biden and Francis W. Biden, and a sister, Valerie Owens. One of his grandfathers was a member of the Pennsylvania State Senate. Biden went to the Archmere Academy in Claymont, where he was a standout halfback/wide receiver on the high school football team. Biden then soon graduated in 1961. He attended the University of Delaware in Newark, he also played football there as well. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in history and political science in 1965, he ranked 506th of 688 in his class. On August 27, 1966, Biden then became a law student, married Neilia Hunter, who was from an affluent background in New York and had attended Syracuse University. They had three children, Joseph R. Biden III , Robert Hunter , and Naomi Christina.


On August 22, 2008 Barack Obama announced that Biden would be his running mate. Biden nevertheless focused on campaigning in economically-challenged areas of swing states and trying to win over all Democrats, especially those who had supported Hillary Rodham Clinton. Biden attacked McCain heavily, despite a long-standing personal friendship. Biden is against the Bush administration's tax cuts and would take back one year of the tax cuts for Americans who make over a million dollars a year. He believes action must be taken on global warming and he supports the creation of a new treaty on climate change that would require emissions reductions from developing countries such as Brazil, India, China, and Mexico. He has also stated his support for investment in technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as well as the creation of a "cap and trade" system. Biden opposes drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and supports governmental funding to find new energy sources as well as upping funding for alternative transportation like Amtrak and mass transit.

n.p "cartoon." StarNews. 7 Sept. 2008:6A

Kurtzman, Daniel. "McCain Beauty Queen." About. com:Political Humor. 8 Sept. 2008<http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/sarahpalin/ig/Sarah-Palin-Cartoons/McCain-Beauty-Queen.-UiV.htm>

Peters, Mike. "I said "change" 10 times today. I said "change" 20 times today. Mc. I said "change" 300 times today. Unemployment. " StarNews. 15 Sept. 2008: 6A

Luckovich, Mike. "To avoid gaffes, you should shield your running mate from the media..Got ya." Cartoonist Group. 14 September. 2008 <http://www.cartoonistgroup.com/bysubject/advice/index.php>

Luckovich, Mike. "Wall Street Got Drunk By Osmosis." The association of American Editorial Cartoonists. 24 July. 2008 <http://editorialcartoonists.com/catoon/display.cfm/56737/>

Interview with Sandy Pridgen

1. Q: What party are you for?

A: John McCain and Sarah Palin


2. Q: Why?

A: Because John McCain has more experience in foreign war and economical
policy.

3. Q: How do you feel about who is running for president?

A: I feel like McCain has more experience on certain issues and that Obama is
young and has not enough experience and in our time of need its not the time
for someone of his kind with inexperience.

4. Q: Do you feel whoever wins will make a difference?

A: No, because the last eight years the elected president has put the economy in
such a bad position that who ever would be elected that they couldn’t make a
change to fix our terrible run down economy.

5. Q: Have you always been democratic or republican?

A: No, im independent. It's my husband and I's first time voting. We haven't
really ever been democratic or republican.

Interview Reflection

For my interview I interviewed my mom. Her name is Sandy Pridgen and she is independent, meaning she has never voted or sided with either democratic or republican. But this year she went with her husband and they both decided to vote. They voted for John McCain and Sarah Palin. She said that she thinks Obama is to young to be our president and that he doesn’t have enough experience for what our country needs. As on the other hand, McCain has a lot of experience in foreign war and economical policy. She believes that McCain has quite the amount of necessary experience for our country. She says it doesn’t matter who wins because neither can make our threadbare economy better because its so terrible and it would take a lot to build back up.

Nuclear Weapons

If elected Barrack Obama would want to try and eliminate the use of nuclear weapons. He will propose on setting a goal of eliminating all nuclear weapons in the world, saying the United States should greatly reduce its stockpiles to lower the threat of nuclear terrorism, aides say. If elected, Mr. Obama plans to say, he will lead a global effort to secure nuclear weapons and material at vulnerable sites within four years. He also will pledge to end production of fissile material for weapons, agree not to build new weapons and remove any remaining nuclear weapons from hair-trigger alert. I agree with Obama because its better to decline the use of nuclear weapons in the world. John McCain strongly supports the development and deployment of theater and national missile defenses. He is committed to deploying effective missile defenses to reduce the possibility of strategic blackmail by rogue regimes and to secure our homeland from the very real prospect of missile attack by present or future adversaries. America should never again have to live in the shadow of missile and nuclear attack. McCain also said he would reduce nuclear stockpile to save American tax dollars. Because I agree with Obama I also agree with McCain on this topic issue.

Global Warming

Global warming is a big issue. It pollutes our air and kills 10 thousand each year. Obama feels that we need to use less oil products and more solar power. He says he can fix this problem with our help. Obama promised to cut greenhouse gases during a pair of speeches today in College Park and Baltimore. He pledged to put mandatory caps on carbon dioxide emissions from industry. He talked about it often enough to imply it was one of his top priorities, along with getting the U.S. out of Iraq by the end of 2009, extending health insurance to all Americans, preventing insurance companies from denying coverage because of pre-existing medical conditions, raising fuel efficiency standards for all vehicles to 40 m.p.g., fixing up crumbling schools and improving America's standing in the world by using more diplomacy to deal with our enemies. I feel that this is a good idea because using solar energy instead of oil products will not use oil so that the price of gas won’t be so expensive. If McCain is elected he will establish a market-based system to curb greenhouse gas emissions, mobilize innovative technologies, and strengthen the economy. He will work with our international partners to secure our energy future, to create opportunities for American industry, and to leave a better future for our children. McCain says he will clean up the planet and make global warming a priority. I also like this idea of emissions and technologies. Its better to use these ideas than to think about using oil products.

Offshore Drilling

Is Obama Reconsidering offshore drilling? He said he would be willing to compromise on his position against offshore oil drilling if it were part of a more overarching strategy to lower energy costs "My interest is in making sure we've got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices," said Obama. Who told The Palm Beach Post early into a two-day swing through Florida.Obama wants to invest in alternative sources for fuel. If elected he would plan on spending billions of dollars to find those sources. I personally don’t like that idea, for the fact that it would cost all Americans tax payers dollars just to find other alternative fuel sources. As for McCain, he believes that offshore drilling is safe. McCain says at every campaign stop that offshore oil drilling is safe, and playing down the risk of environmental accidents, even when faced with the power of a hurricane. "I'm aware that off the coast of Louisiana and Texas there are oil rigs, as we well know, and those rigs have survived, very successfully, the impacts of hurricanes, Hurricane Katrina, as far as Louisiana's concerned," McCain said at a town hall in Michigan last week. I would agree with McCain about how offshore drilling is safe because at least it wouldn’t cost any money for the tax payers and we would still be getting the fuel we needed.

Technology Issues

In the last few decades the Technological involvement in every day life has blew up. A few decades ago the idea of your IPod was virtually non-existent where today leaving the house without it is a cause for alarm and you have to turn around and go get it.?!? About 2 decades ago the idea of having a computer at home or in school was virtually non-existent to the average american, as was the idea of the world wide web. When now a days it is rare to find someone who doesn’t have a computer at home. The world of technology continues to grow at a rate you wouldn’t think would be possible and how it effects our country is all determined by the next president.

Obama says he will protect the availability of the internet. Part of the idea of our country is that we have a freedom to look at, listen to and write whatever we so choose. Even including anything on the internet. By keeping in open he furthers this idea. At the same time he will be keeping our children safe by increasing enforcement resources and forensic tools for law enforcement, and working together between law enforcement and the private sector to point out and prosecute people who hurt the Internet to try to exploit children. McCain, as I find, has furthered similar views. They both plan to invest money into the field of technological science.

Evautated science issues

The environment is changing expeditiously. It’s changing so quickly that the issues being addressed aren’t being addressed quick enough. Global warming is something that’s harming and ruining our earth we live in. The sun is melting our polar ice caps and leaving the animals there to become extinct. Things that can reduce global warming is to improve energy efficiency like more efficient cars, appliances, and industrial systems use less energy, develop and use energy sources that emit little or no carbon dioxide, improve forest and agricultural management practices, and reducing the impacts of climate change like new varieties of crops that can be developed to grow in changed climates. Offshore drilling is also a huge danger. It can cause oil spills from oil tankers transporting oil from the platform to onshore facilities, from pipelines doing the same, and from leaks and accidents on the platform. I feel that citizens must demand that oil companies use the vast amount of resources they already have access to, and demand that the oil industry stop exporting domestic supplies of oil to other countries for higher profits. Nuclear weapons are highly expensive and can cause damage. It is one of those things that we all wish everyone would get together and say "We do not need them anymore. Let's all agree to dismantle them and never build another." However, this will never happen, so we have them on the MAD principle: Mutually Assured Destruction. This means that if you launch one, I'll launch one, then you'll launch more, and I'll launch more.

Positive and Negative Science Issues

Global warming is a very severe issue that needs to be taken care of. It’s a good thing that it’s being discussed and taken care of now than later on for our future children to experience. It’s not good that global warming is harming our world. Its melting our polar ice caps and is causing our arctic animals to become extinct. Nuclear weapons are good for our country to defend itself from when outer enemies decide to attack. Nuclear weapons cost an ample amount of money for our tax payers to fork out so we will be able to keep our country safe. All we want to do is show other countries that we are more independent. What we want is more oil and if hurting the environment to do so then we will. Its not good that we are harming the environment of our surrounding animals. Its giving them no place to live and moving them elsewhere or possibly killing them.

Poll Predictions

The state that I chose is Alaska because global warming is a severe issue there and needs to be fixed. Global warming is the increase in the average measured temperature of the earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century, and its projected continuation. The environment there is terrible because global warming is melting the polar ice caps and killing all animals there that are living. Polar Bears are becoming extinct and that is one of the reasons too that I picked Alaska. I’ve always loved polar bears ever since when I was little because I got this polar bear stuffed animal and believe it or not I still have it. I support fixing and helping global warming and saving animals lives that live there.

This Republican collage shows how McCain is supporting against abortion and that he is pro-life. He said, "At its core, abortion is a human tragedy. To effect meaningful change, we must engage the debate at a human level." McCain says that he is proud of his pro-life record in public life, and will continue to maintain it. He will not draw his children into this discussion. As a leader of a pro-life party with a pro-life position, he will persuade young Americans to understand the importance of the preservation of the rights of the unborn. This collage is showing how he’s also against gay marriage. He says same-sex couples should be allowed to enter into legal agreements for insurance and other purposes, but he opposes gay marriage and believes in "the unique status of marriage between and man and a woman." Gender is being shown here as well. Since John McCain chose Sarah Palin some people might vote for her because of her gender or vise versa with Obama because of his race. Its also showing in this collage how he supports having and lowering the taxes.

In this collage it shows how Obama is democratic which shows it by having the sign of a donkey. Obama is all for change. That’s why it is bolded big in blue and red letters. Change can happen only if both sides really want it and are willing to compromise on important issues to get it. He is for changing the U.S as a whole all our problems, the energy crisis, the war in Iraq, RACISM, basically everything that Bush screwed up and then some. Obama wants to progress. He plans on making major life changing decisions to make our country a better place to live. He says that his interest is in making sure we've got the kind of comprehensive energy policy that can bring down gas prices. Which to me is a very important issue. “If, in order to get that passed, we have to compromise in terms of a careful, well thought-out drilling strategy that was carefully circumscribed to avoid significant environmental damage.” said Obama. Barrack is also as seen in this collage pro-choice. Which means that a woman should have the right to decide what happens to her body, what is best for herself and her life, others around her, and in a lot of cases, for any child that could be brought into this world.