Four areas where the President doesn’t go far enough (or goes in the wrong direction) from where I think U.S. policy should be going: Drug legalization (or decriminalization); Use of Pardons; Recognition of Gay Marriage; and Treatment of Americans in so-called National Security situations (warrantless wiretapping; assassinations abroad).
If Romney dared to go the direction I prefer in any of these areas, I would seriously consider voting for him over Obama. Fat chance, I know, but still I throw it out there for his consideration.
On the first of these topics, here’s a good piece from The Economist’s Democracy in America blog.
Here’s the bit I liked. “Drug decriminalisation, in contrast, has been a success everywhere it has been implemented. At some point this has got to become a fully recognised fact of public discourse, and perhaps some time after that it will penetrate through to a policy level. Unfortunately, America’s massive investments over the past 40 years in building up the machinery of the war on drugs have created powerful constituencies that have so far been effective in sabotaging moves in this direction.”
Mad Dog, Esquire 