This week, I was struck by the rare inspiration to do some
research. With the 2016 Presidential Election coming up soon, and the
candidates gearing up for a marathon, I decided to check out the field. I’ve
never been incredibly keen on politics—don’t get me wrong, I care about our
leaders and believe voting is a great privilege of citizenship—but, the
constant mudslinging and bloody battles of ego that accompany each campaign
often leave a bad taste in my mouth.
So this time around the sun, I’ve decided to bypass the
televised broadcasts and radio talk-shows in favor of a little new-fangled
internet research. I set out with the intention of creating an entire chart
with all of the candidates’ basic views on hot-off-the-press issues, but then I
realized that I was not the first to conceive this brilliant idea.
There are
many websites that have compiled candidates’ views, voting records, quotes, and
more to create a vast database of political profiles…all for your viewing
pleasure. Compiling a simple chart of the issues, I found, was far more complex
than I have the time or energy to tackle. Turns out we are dealing with real people
facing real moral decisions, and unfortunately the black-and-white chart idea
wouldn’t do any of them proper justice. I decided that I would pour over the records
of these men and women to find one non-obvious interesting fact about each of
them! Of course, these facts are what I
happen to consider interesting, and may or may not actually have anything to do
with their political views or campaigns. Let the fun begin!
Jeb Bush
|
Married to his high school
sweetheart, an exchange student from Mexico.
|
Ben Carson
|
Neurosurgeon who separated
Siamese Twins
|
Chris Christie
|
His favorite song is Thunder
Road by Bruce Springsteen.
|
Ted Cruz
|
His real first name is Rafael.
|
Carly Fiorina
|
In 1977, she taught English to
Italian businessmen in Bologna.
|
Jim Gilmore
|
His favorite sport is listed as
“The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing.”
|
Lindsey Graham
|
In 1977, he created a trucking
logistics company with 100 employees.
|
Mike Huckabee
|
Sent his kid’s to public
school, believes other government officials should as well.
|
Bobby Jindal
|
He became a Christian in high
school. His parents are actively Hindu and emigrated from India.
|
John Kasich
|
As a college student, he wrote
to President Nixon and was even able to meet him.
|
Sarah Palin
|
Before Tina Fey played her on
Saturday Night Live, Palin apparently was aware of their uncanny resemblance;
she actually dressed up as Fey.
|
George Pataki
|
He has two dogs, named Balto
and Bradley.
|
Rand Paul
|
He was accused of being a
member of the NoZe Brotherhood, a collegiate “secret society” founded at
Baylor University. The brotherhood was founded as a joke, after a founding
member who had a large nose.
|
Rick Perry
|
He studied to be a veterinarian,
but Organic Chemistry made him decide to be a pilot instead.
|
Marco Rubio
|
He has identified himself at
different times as both Catholic and Mormon.
|
Rick Santorum
|
He and his wife have eight
children.
|
Donald Trump
|
He is a member of the Board of
Directors of the Police Athletic League, an organization that enables police
to provide recreational sports as constructive activities for youth.
|
Scott Walker
|
He was raised as a Pastor’s
Kid, and his favorite movies are the Star Wars series.
|
Lincoln Chaffee
|
He has a horse named Trapper.
|
Hillary Clinton
|
She was a staff attorney on
Nixon’s Watergate impeachment investigation.
|
Martin O’Malley
|
His father’s name was Thomas O’Malley
(unfortunately not O’Malley the Alley Cat), and he was an Air Force Pilot in
World War II.
|
Bernie Sanders
|
He identifies as Jewish, and has
voted in many cases for the protection of animal welfare.
|
Jill Stein
|
She grew up Jewish and married
a “Protestant atheist.”
|
Elizabeth Warren
|
She is 1/32 Cherokee, and her
mother grew up in Oklahoma on a reservation.
|
James Webb
|
He was a screenwriter and producer
of the television series “Rules of Engagement” and wrote several books.
|
Phew! That was a lot of information, and a lot of candidates.
It took me about four evenings to sift through all of it. There are eighteen
Republican GOP candidates and seven Democratic candidates currently in the race
for their respective primaries. For those who are interested, below are the
links to the two comprehensive websites where I found this information.
VoteSmart is a great tool for at-a-glance candidate issue
research. It includes everything from brief biographies to voting records and
positions on key issues. It is awesome for the person who likes their research
to-the-point and doesn’t want to sift through a ton of information. Just type
in a candidate’s name, and bam! Everything is on one page under neat little
file-folder links.
On the Issues is a more information-heavy website for the
research-lover. You can click on the campaign candidates you want to research,
whether it’s the high-profile 2016 Presidential Race or even local city campaigns
for mayor, and find pretty much everything you ever wanted to know about a
candidate. It includes bullet-points of quote and vote information under convenient
headings. At the bottom of each candidate page, it includes a chart mapping out
how conservative or liberal the candidate is, based on all of the information
they have researched.
You don’t have to be a hard-core politics nut to be an
informed voter anymore. For those of you who don’t know how to vote, below are
two resources for voters in Arkansas and Texas.
The voting day for the primaries in Texas and Arkansas is Tuesday
March 1, 2016, and the general election is in November. Happy
Voting!
Image Credit: https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2212/2277408667_0d8db8f776.jpg