Miles to Go, Promises to Keep

In Barack Obama's convention acceptance speech last week, he got into some specifics as to what he would do as President:

(1) Stop giving tax breaks to corporations that ship jobs overseas, start giving them to companies that create good jobs in America, and close corporate loopholes and tax havens.

(2) Eliminate capital gains taxes for the small businesses and the start-ups that will create the high-wage, high-tech jobs of tomorrow.

(3) Cut taxes for 95% of all working families.

(4) End our dependence on oil from the Middle East in ten years.

(5) Tap our natural gas reserves, invest in clean coal technology, and find ways to safely harness nuclear power.

(6) Help our auto companies re-tool, so that the fuel-efficient cars of the future are built right here in America, and make it easier for the American people to afford these new cars.

(7) Invest 150 billion dollars over the next decade in affordable, renewable sources of energy - wind power and solar power and the next generation of biofuels.

(8) Invest in early childhood education, provide every child a world-class education, make sure every young American who commits to serving community or country can afford a college education.

(9) Recruit an army of new teachers, pay them higher salaries, give them more support, and ask for higher standards and more accountability.

(10) Provide affordable, accessible health care for every single American by lowering your premiums if you have health care and by granting the option to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves if you don’t.

(11) Make insurance companies stop discriminating against those who are sick and need care the most.

(12) Help families with paid sick days, better family leave, and equal pay for an equal day's work.

(13) Change our bankruptcy laws to protect pensions ahead of CEO bonuses.

(14) Protect Social Security for future generations.

(15) Go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less.

(16) Send more resources and more troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11, take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights, and finish the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.

(17) End the war in Iraq responsibly and remove our troops from Iraq.

(18) Rebuild our military to meet future conflicts and only send our troops into harm's way with a clear mission and a sacred commitment to give them the equipment they need in battle and the care and benefits they deserve when they come home.

(19) Renew tough, direct diplomacy to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons and curb Russian aggression.

(20) Restore our moral standing and build new partnerships to defeat the threats of the 21st century: terrorism and nuclear proliferation, poverty and genocide, climate change and disease.

This week, John McCain had his own list:

(1) Keep taxes low and cut them to help small businesses grow and create jobs, and to help American companies compete and keep jobs from moving overseas.

(2) Open new markets to our goods and services.

(3) Make it easier for more Americans to find and keep good health care insurance.

(4) Double the child tax exemption from $3,500 to $7,000.

(5) Cut government spending and get rid of failed programs.

(6) Open new markets and prepare workers to compete in the world economy.

(7) Help workers who’ve lost a job that won’t come back find a new one that won’t go away, and prepare them for the jobs of today using our community colleges to help train people for new opportunities in their communities and, for workers in industries that have been hard hit, helping make up part of the difference in wages between their old job and a temporary, lower paid one while they receive retraining.

(8) Shake up failed school bureaucracies with competition, empower parents with choice, remove barriers to qualified instructors, attract and reward good teachers, and help bad teachers find another line of work, andgive parents a choice in the education of their children - a better public school, a private one, or a charter school - schools that answer to parents and students.

(9) Produce more energy at home by drilling new wells offshore, building more nuclear power plants, developing clean coal technology, increasing use of wind, tide, solar and natural gas, encouraging the development and use of flex fuel, hybrid and electric automobiles, and creating millions of new jobs in industries that will be the engine of our future prosperity and be there when your children enter the workforce.

(10) Establish good relations with Russia so we need not fear a return of the Cold War.