Democrat or Repulican?

I am not a very politically minded person. I have never gotten too involved with it beyond the surface. Therefore, I feel a little inept during political conversations. I find it fascinating that people that ARE politically minded know so much about the process as well as the people involved.

So, for my personal education ONLY - not to start any political debate, I ask the following questions:

1) Are you a repulican, democrat, liberal, or some other party? Have you always affiliated with this party?

2) Do you tend to stay in your decided party when you are voting? Or does it depend on the candidate?

3) What are the traits that you look at to decide what party you want to affliate with?

4) Tell me 3 positive things about your party.


RULES:

1) You do not have to answer all of the questions
2) Post your answers in the guestbook
3) This is a FRIENDLY survey - for my education only, and possibly to educate others
4) Please only tell me positives about your party - do NOT say negatives or bash any other party or any person that does not agree with you and yours

If there is one thing that I have learned over the years is that there is always more to learn. I don't believe in being so closed minded that nothing else can come into my brain, nor do I believe in being so open minded that my brains fall out. No matter what my stand is on something, I do like to hear opinions that vary from mine. More times than not, I find myself seeing that there are things that I did not know or did not understand that make me more understanding of how others think and why they think the way that they do.

I hope that this does not turn into an ugly discussion, please keep it friendly.

I will start and answer the questions myself.

I am a Republican because they tend to be a little more conservative in the areas that I am a little more conservative. I tend to stay within my party when I vote, but am willing to look at the individual candidate - there are things I agree with on each party. As I stated, I don't normally get too involved with politics, so I tend to look at just a few things when deciding on a candidate. The stand on abortion is a big one for me because I see that as an indicator on how their view is on human life. Is that a foolproof way to decide? No, it is not. Could someone believe in abortion and still value the unborn child? I suppose that they could. My point is that MY PERSONAL BELIEFS on abortion tend to mesh better with the Republican party. However, my stand on Stem Cell studies tends to mesh better with the Democrat party. This may seem like an oxymoron to many. I feel that embryos that ARE ALREADY ON THE WAY TO BEING DESTROYED THROUGH THE DECISION OF THE PARENTS can be used to hopefully find ways to cure other children of terminal genetic diseases. From what I have learned from my research, embryonic stem cells come only from parents wishing to destroy remaining embryos that they may have - NOT from wanted embryos.

So, I can see positives for each party. I would like to learn more though. I tend to learn more by hearing from other people - not the politicians themselves.

(BTW - just because I am a Repulican does not mean that I support 100 percent everything Bush did and everything the McCain planned. NOR does it mean that I am totally against Obama. I believe both candidates had a lot to bring to the table, but I was not completely comfortable with either one of them. Does that make any sense?)

Anyway, I look forward to hearing from everyone - hopefully from all party affiliations.

If you have never posted in the guestbook before, it is easy. Just click on "Comments" at the bottom of this post. Then, on the screen that pops up, type your comments in the box. Underneath, pick your ID - if you are not a blogger, do not have open ID or a URL of your own, click "Anonymous." If you do click anonymous, be sure to sign your post so that I know who you are. :-)