She or He
AJ Robinson

I've read several postings on various places where people say, "Convince me to vote for Her without mentioning His name." Okay, I'm up for the challenge. Here we go.

I am not a huge fan of Her.

Let me make one point clear from the onset. Truth is I would have preferred the "Other Him," as candidate, but I'm not going to stew or Bern over that.

Let's start with a biggie: climate change. Now, I know there are still some deniers out there, so I'm going to go a step further and not mention that by name. I personally think it is ridiculous, as it is settled science.

I defer to actual scientists on matters of science, but let's not bother going there, okay? Boosting our renewables: wind and solar; cutting back on coal and oil is just plain good. It's good for the environment and good for our economy. The less money we send to countries, which are less than friendly to America, is great. So, who is more likely to push that agenda?

Next is the Supreme Court. The next president will make two, maybe, three appointments to the court. What sort of judges do we want on the court for possibly the next thirty years? Do we want thoughtful considerate men and women who will protect our rights or essentially corporate male attorneys who will treat businesses as people and maybe extend Citizens United?

There are millions of illegal aliens in American. How do we address their presence? I know the idea of merely rounding them all up is very appealing to some people, but have you stopped and thought about the actual process?

Imagine how many women and men it would take to round up the illegals?

What would be the cost? Where would the money come from?

Then there's the idea of the wall, possibly the biggest civil engineering project since the Great Wall of China. As a civil engineer, I can tell you that such a structure will be massive, expensive and incredibly difficult to build. Did I mention the cost? Let's be honest, does anyone seriously believe that we're going to get Mexico to pay for it? If so, how, no vagaries, no generalities, how, give details!

Women's rights are under attack across the America; everything from abortion to birth control, equal pay and more. Mistreatment of minorities is common. Denied basic rights, in the guise of religious liberty, they live under a cloud of permanent suspicion.

I'm sorry, but using religion as an excuse to push bigotry is just about the most un-religious thing you can do! Which candidate attacks or ridicules anyone who isn’t white and male on almost a daily basis? Hey, you can call it not being politically correct, but tell me that after He insults you!

There’s also income inequality. For thirty years, we believed in trickledown economics is the answer: cut the taxes on the rich and everything will be fine. Our economy will boom and the deficit will vanish.

We're still waiting. As we wait, the wages of working class folks remain stagnant, despite productivity going up and the rich just keep getting richer. How long are we supposed to wait for them to create jobs? Considering the fact that one candidate is calling for more tax cuts for the rich, I don't know about you, but I've had my fill of trickledown. How about we try trickle up for a while and see how that goes? Could it be any worse?

Healthcare is an important issue. I'm the first to say that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is far from perfect. I'd like to see national healthcare as in every other industrialized and development nation.

ISIL is the second biggest concern of Americans.

As one candidate and his party want to repeal it and, they claim, replace it, I'm dubious about that. What do we replace ACA with, nothing? We never do get details. Why is that? Would it help to repeal the lifetime cap? Might we repeal the rule that says a pre-existing condition doesn’t mean you can’t get medical coverage? That doesn't sound very appealing to me. Adjust it to make it better, but which candidate is better suited to do that?

There is also ISIS, ISIL or Dash. Next to the economy, global terrorism is the important issue. The late Robin Williams joked that a woman should be president because a woman would never make a bomb that killed someone; she'd make a bomb that made you feel bad. Every twenty-eight days there'd be some intense negotiations.

Okay, just a joke, but it raises a valid point regarding the temperament of the president. Do we want a thoughtful considerate president, that will think before acting or do we want a thin-skinned reactionary whose first response to a perceived insult is to send out a nasty tweet; governance by tweet.

Please note that last statement not only didn't I mention any names, I also didn't mention gender. Yet, if you knew whom I was referring, in the former and the latter, then you also know the answer to the question. If that isn't enough to convince you who to vote for, then nothing more I can say will change your mind. Therefore, I'm done.

Here's hoping we make a wise choice this November.