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American Studies

AP US History

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Scholastic Bowl

Political Union

Barack Obama

Questions

Iraq

As President, what would you do in the handling of the War in Iraq?

Let me begin by saying that I have opposed this rash war from the beginning, and I regret to say that I am the only one on this stage who has opposed it from the beginning. That being said, I believe it is of the utmost absurdity to declare George Bush’s troop surge a victory. The goal of the surge was to provide enough breathing room for Iraq’s torn parties to reconcile, and they have not done that. The notion that my Republican colleagues have that it is a victory to go from horrific violence to just intolerable levels of violence is fundamentally wrong and misleading, as is the entire war itself. That is why as President, I will end this war in Iraq. Immediately upon taking office, I will begin withdrawing one to two combat brigades a month, and have all our troops home within 16 months. I will make sure that we do not keep any permanent bases there, and only keep enough troops there to protect our embassy, diplomats, and carry out tactical strikes on Al Qaeda, if necessary. We have an obligation to do this responsibly; we need to engage Iraqi government officials to reconcile, and fundamentally change their broken government from the ground up. We need to get the UN involved on this, and diplomatically engage Iraq’s neighboring countries, Iran and Syria. It’s time to end this war, and I believe we can be as careful getting out of Iraq, as we were careless getting into Iraq.

Homeland Security

What should we do about illegal immigration?

I firmly believe that we are a nation of laws, and of immigrants, and we do not have to compromise the two to reach comprehensive immigration reform. The first step we need to take in this is to strengthen our borders: we cannot have hundreds of thousands of people coming across our borders and not know who they are or how they got here. Second, we have to prevent and punish companies who hire these undocumented workers, and that is why I support a tamper-proof verification employment card. And third, we have to deal with the 12 million that are already here. We have to give them a pathway to citizenship because we cannot morally or logistically deport them. We have to put them at the back of the line to gain citizenship, ensure they learn English, make sure they have a job, and make sure they do not have a criminal background. And I’ll add this: we are all immigrants, and we cannot think of this wave of immigrants any differently than we would think of our next-door neighbors.

How would you, as President, protect our nation from another terrorist attack?

It is a dangerous mistake the Bush Administration has made to not follow the guidelines of the 9/11 Commission. When I am President, I will tighten up the four biggest gaps in our homeland security. One, we need to protect our chemical plants better with the 9/11 Commission’s recommendations. Two, we need to track and keep a thorough record of the nuclear fuel we spend. Three, we need to take care of our citizens who become the victims of emergencies, and this means we cannot allow another Hurricane Katrina debacle; we need to ensure every city has a pre-determined evacuation plan, and we need to provide for the reunification of separated families. And four, we need to keep our drinking water safe, and provide for the monitoring and security of our water systems. That is why I have introduced or sponsored legislation to do all of these things. It is our responsibility to come together as a nation to deal with this issue, because terrorists do not attack a single party or partisan, they attack our whole nation, and that is something that I do not intend to happen.

Gun Control

What does the Second Amendment mean to you?

I hold the Second Amendment as dear to me as any other part of the Bill of Rights, however I believe the Founders of our nation did not want the citizens to be unlimited and unchecked in their arms. I believe we have a fundamental responsibility to protect those who are put at risk by violent criminals. That is why I will properly enforce the gun control laws on the books now, as well as push for other options. I would start by banning the sale and transfer of all semi-automatic weapons. I would push to increase state restrictions on firearm purchase and possession. I would require all gun manufacturers include child safety locks with their guns. We have an obligation to allow our citizens arms, as the Second Amendment outlines. However we have an obligation that transcends the Second Amendment to protect our citizens from these violent criminals.

Given the Omaha Mall and Virginia Tech shootings, what should the Federal Government do to prevent future public shootings?

When the massacre at Virginia Tech happened, we all grieved together as a nation through that tragic loss of so much life. And it’s unfortunate that these things happen in our country, however it is not as much due to a lack of legislation as it is enforcement and the right mindset. We have to acknowledge that a gunman has a hole in his heart, and needs more than punishment. These people need treatment. Not just this, but we need to start thinking of the 30 children who die over a period of six months in a bad area as just as much of a tragedy as 30 kids dying in six hours. We need to devote our attention to these tragedies in order to work toward ending them, and we cannot wait for the next large-scale massacre to start doing it.

Moral Crisis

What is the most significant moral crisis we as a nation face today?

We as a nation today face many issues that beg for our action; not out of personal benefit, but out of morality. I believe that none of these issues can be fully acted on until we change Washington’s ways. We need to act not as Democrats or Republican, but as Americans to keep the control of our government in the people’s hands, and not the corporate lobbyists’ and PACs’. We need to keep doing what I have been doing in Congress, which is open up all government actions and expenses to the people. We need to unite as a nation and tell the lobbyists that their day of setting Washington’s agenda is over. It is time for what they American people want, not what the lobbyists want, and what the American people want is change.

To what extent should the U.S. condone the use of torture in the War on Terror?