George here is the Bush & Gore Presidential Issues:
1) Abortion
a) Bush - Tolerates abortion in cases of rape, incest or when a woman's life is in jeopardy from the pregnancy. Would not make anti-abortion constitutional amendment a priority.
b) Gore - Believes abortion is "fundamental personal right." Supports Medicaid abortion financing despite past statements to the contrary.
2) Affirmative Action
a) Bush - Opposes racial preferences. Supports Texas law requiring public universities to admit the top 10 percent of every high school's graduating class.
b) Gore - Favors affirmative action.
3) Campaign Finance
a) Bush - First presidential candidate ever to raise more than $50 million would ban soft money, raise the $1,000 limit on contributions to $3,400 and require full disclosure. Refusing federal matching funds. Believes that the present campaign finance laws should be enforced before any more laws are put on the books.
b) Gore - Favors ban on soft money and increase taxpayer financing of elections. Require TV networks to give candidates free time. However, has consistently broken existing campaign finance laws, and is only proposing more laws to divert attention from his past behavior such as: After 1996 election, admitted he had made fund-raising calls from his White House office despite federal laws against fund-raising on federal property. Acknowledged he knew a 1996 event he attended at a Buddhist temple was a fund-raiser.
c) ragingbull.altavista.com
4) Child Care
a) Bush - Unspecified extra spending on after-school programs.
b) Gore - Favors significant spending on child care, including subsidies and tax credits for low-income families and mothers at home, based on five-year, $21-billion Clinton administration plan. Ensure preschool is available for all children. Allow workers to choose time off instead of overtime pay. Expand family leave law to cover firms with 25 or more workers and to let parents take time off for teacher visits and child's routine medical appointments.
5) Defense
a) Bush - Increase weapons research and development spending by $20 billion over five years, spend extra $1 billion a year to raise military salaries beyond pending pay increase, build missile defense systems for deployment inside and outside U.S. Supports money for F-22 stealth fighters.
b) Gore - Wants unspecified "sensible" increase in defense spending. Has helped negotiate arms reduction and nuclear stability arrangements. As senator, voted for SDI and B-2s. Supported military force in Persian Gulf War and the nuclear test ban treaty also backed by Bradley but no other candidates.
6) Education
a) Bush - Favors government-funded vouchers for private school. Supports scholarships of $1,500 a year for children in public schools that fail state testing for three years. The money could be used for private schooling, tutoring or "whatever offers hope." States that improve their public schools would get up to $500 million extra over five years from Washington; in states where test scores don't improve, 5 percent of federal education financing would be shifted to charter schools. $3 billion in loan guarantees in two years to help build 2,000 charter schools. Let families put $5,000 per year per student into education savings accounts from which money could be withdrawn tax-free for K-12 expenses.
b) Gore - Opposes government-funded vouchers for private school. Favors more choice among public schools. For public education, expand federal education standards. Tougher testing of teachers. $10,000 bonuses and retraining aid to those who switch careers to teaching, plus bonuses of "up to $10,000" to those who go to college to become teachers and agree to serve in ""a school that needs your help." National goal of reducing average class size to 20 pupils or fewer.
7) Environment
a) Bush - Supports existing moratorium on California and Florida offshore drilling. Is becoming "more convinced" global warming exists but opposes unratified treaty to cut greenhouse gases. Unspecified increase in spending on conservation. Created largely voluntary program to cut air pollution from 800 Texas factories and signed law forcing electrical utilities to clean up or close. In 1998 favored changing federal law to limit habitats eligible to be designated as endangered.
b) Gore - Move beyond moratorium and ban all new offshore oil drilling in federal waters off Florida and California, including zones where companies have spent billions to secure drilling rights. Spend $2 billion over 10 years to set aside more parkland, paying for it by charging hardrock mining companies to extract minerals from federal lands. Led U.S. efforts for climate-change treaty. Clinton administration record includes tougher clean air standards and protection of Everglades and California desert but allowing clear cutting in some national forests.
8) Foreign Policy
a) Bush - Isolationism and trade protectionism are a "shortcut to chaos, an approach that abandons our allies and our ideals. The vacuum left by America's retreat would invite challenges to our power." Move U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. Keep sanctions on Cuba. Make aid to Russia conditional on its cessation of civilian killings in Chechnya.
b) Gore - Unspecified extra spending on foreign affairs. United States should show willingness to "use our strength -- to lead the world toward what is right and just."
9) Gun Control / 2nd Admendment
a) Bush - Enforce existing laws designed to keep firearms out of the hands of criminals and fierce prosecution of those who commit a crime with a firearm. believes that tampering with the Constitutional right for law-respecting people to own a firearm will only put the criminal element at an advantage, since criminals don't usually obey gun laws. Raise age for handgun purchases to 21. Supports instant background checks at gun shows, opposes universal gun registration. Signed laws in Texas permitting carrying of concealed weapons and protecting gun makers from lawsuits from cities.
b) Gore - Supports mandatory photo ID licenses for handgun buyers. Would require manufacturers and federally licensed sellers to report gun sales to a state authority to help trace the owner when gun is used in crime. Supports banning "Saturday night specials." Basically, believes that guns in the hands of law-respecting people pose a threat to society. In 1999, cast tie-breaking Senate vote for instant background checks at gun shows. Voted against waiting period and dealer licensing in 1980s. The Clinton/Gore/Reno Justice Department has consistently ignored enforcement of gun laws and has refused to prosecute many cases where a gun crime has fallen within federal jurisdiction.
10) Health Care
a) Bush - Expand medical savings accounts. Would consider charging wealthier Medicare recipients more for coverage. Strengthen tax incentives to small businesses that provide health care to employees.
b) Gore - Expand coverage, without guaranteeing universal access, and create new prescription drug benefit under Medicare offering up to $1,000 a year to cover half the drug costs of recipients paying $24 a month in premiums. Children in families earning up to 250 percent of poverty level would qualify for federally supported state health coverage, up from 200 percent now. Families earning more and lacking insurance could buy into state program. Goal: All children covered by 2005. Also: 25 percent refundable tax credit for premiums for self-employed; long-term care tax credit. His estimated cost: more than $250 billion over 10 years.
11) Immigration
a) Bush - Rejects English-only mandates. Supports increasing visas for highly skilled workers. Has supported expansion of program letting temporary workers come in to fill demand for farm and service jobs.
b) Gore - Says each wave of immigrants has enriched the nation, favors bilingual education and letting legal immigrant qualify for benefits.
12) Labor
a) Bush - Favors $1 minimum-wage increase but would let states opt out. Backed free trade opposed by labor. Favors forcing unions to get approval from members before spending any dues on political contributions.
b) Gore - Favors $1 increase in minimum wage over two years and then yearly increase indexed to the rise in the nation's median wage. Favors stronger picketing rights, ban on permanent striker replacements and ban on federal contracts to companies that break labor laws. Backed free trade agreements opposed by organized labor. Would consider limiting compulsory overtime work.
13) Taxes
a) Bush - Billions in tax incentives to boost charitable giving and ability of religious groups to provide social services; pledges to veto any income tax increase. Opposed plan by congressional Republicans to save money by giving working poor the earned income tax credit in monthly installments instead of as a lump sum. He believes that federal income taxes are too high and that a tax cut for all Americans is the best way to achieve fiscal responsibility in government. Bush believes that money paid to the government is that of the people, and should be returned to them rather than waste it on social spending programs.
b) Gore - Has called for middle-class tax cuts for education and retirement, and higher earning cap for receiving earned income tax credit, all costing $250 billion to $300 billion. Opposed Republican plan for $792 billion in wide-ranging cuts. However, does not support a tax cut and has not ruled out raising taxes in order to raise government spending on programs designed to appease special interests. Gore believes that government needs come first, not those of hard-working families.
14) Trade
a) Bush - Supports NAFTA, would seek more liberalized trade and admit China to WTO.
b) Gore - Supports liberalized trade agreements and ability of president to negotiate more such deals. Says Clinton administration will do more to see that trade pacts don't hurt environment.
15) Welfare
a) Bush - Proposes $8 billion plan to get religious and other volunteer organizations to assume more responsibilities for the needy. Supports welfare time limits, work or education requirements for those able, and requirement that unwed teen mothers live at home or in group home. In Texas, proposed higher child-care aid and other transition benefits.
b) Gore - Increased reliance on religious and other volunteer organizations to help needy.
16) Social Security
a) Bush - favors a reform of the system, and allowing individuals to invest a portion of their Social Security funds into private investments to protect future generations in their retirement. The Governor believes in the individual's ability to plan and make decisions for retirement.
b) Gore - “Lockbox” vows to keep Social Security as it is as has not ruled out raising income taxes to further fund the system. Gore believes that individuals should not be given the ability to decide and plan for retirement without government intervention. However, voted to increase taxes on social security recipients and cast the tie breaking vote to raise the minimum social security benefits to age 67.
17) National Debt
a) Bush -
b) Gore -
18) Medicare
a) ragingbull.altavista.com
b) Bush - $198 billion in new Medicare spending over 10 years. Under his approach, private health-insurance providers would compete with the federal government to provide prescription drug coverage. Medicare would cover drug costs on a sliding scale, with recipients at or below 135 percent of the poverty level receiving full coverage and those earning over 175 percent of the poverty rate receiving 25 percent coverage. The annual spending cap would be set at $6,000. The Bush plan also includes a four-year transition period during which states would be given $48 billion in block grants to help their seniors purchase drugs.
c) Gore - proposed the creation of a prescription drug benefit under the Medicare program at a 10-year cost of $253 billion. Under the plan, the government would pay for half of the first $5,000 in spending for beneficiaries and cap their total, out-of-pocket drug expenses at $4,000 per year.
19) Budget Surplus
a) Bush -
b) Gore -
20) Spending Programs
a) Bush - believes that much government spending is wasteful, and ultimately ends up hurting the people it seeks to help. Bush will seek to cut wasteful spending from the federal budget.
b) Gore - believes that more government spending programs should be created in addition to the ones that already exist. Gore believes that government control is better than individual initiative.
Of course we could debate all night and in a week or so the bottomline will be who gets elected.
:-) Gary |
