clouds of doubt

In a Wall Street Journal article entitled “The Tax Plans Still Works,” Karl Rove states that, “Mr. McCain has only one hope: to drive home doubts about Mr. Obama based on his record, and share as much as he can about his own values and vision to reassure voters.” With little more than a week left before the election, McCain better act fast. Rove’s comment makes me wonder what makes people vote a certain way. Do American citizens vote based on doubts they may have about one candidate or rather trust they have in the other?

More and more I feel as though it’s moreso doubts than reassurances that the American public votes on. The other day I was talking to my mom about the election, asking who she was planning on voting for. She started out her response with, “Well I’m not crazy about either of them…” and then listed her fears for America if Obama were to be elected on November 4th. On the other hand, many people who are planning on voting for Obama have said that they made their decision because “we don’t need another 4 years of Bush.” Of course not all voters vote based on doubts—there are some that are genuinely informed of their candidate and support what he has put on his platform--however, I do feel like the majority of voters lack full confidence in their candidate of choice and rather are voting for them based for fears of what may happen if the other candidate were elected.

I feel as though this fear is a result of the vulnerable position our nation is in right now. There’s fear for the future of our nation and therefore, naturally, there’s fear for who the next president of the United States will be, and what actions he will take or not take. It's harder to put our full faith in one man, and much easier to point out the flaws and doubts of another.