I’ve rarely been in the cool crowd.

I’ve never been the best looking, the most athletic, the richest or the most eloquent. Occassionaly I’ve been cool because of what I did for a living, where I lived or who I volunteered for – but those things, like many are fleeting.

I’d like to be cool enough to vote for Obama, but I really can’t bring myself to. Really, I can’t. He’s charming, a great speaker, rallies a crowd and gives hope for something better – but he’s also a not too hidden socialist. While I can appreciate some of the premises of socialist thought I don’t see the practical outworking of socialist leaning progressivism here in the United States.

While I like the leadership qualities of that Obama may bring, I don’t know if I’d like where he’d lead us. Call me a capitalist pig if you’d like, but continuing to take responsibility away from people doesn’t seem like the best way to promote a healthy nation.

This isn’t really just an Obama or party affiliation problem, Barrack is merely evidence in how we encourage the system to continue to take our resources and “spend them better” than we could.

Bringing education, health care and the like under a central authority will somehow solve all of our problems? Are we that naive? Ask any teacher (and I have asked many) if they’d rather have more money for the school or parents who were responsible and overwhelmingly they’d ask for the latter. Yet, when we talk about improving education the notion that taking responsibility/authority from parents seems to win out.

People complain that health care is too costly, that they can’t get the procedures done within our current system and that by centralizing health care these problems will abate. Do we really think so? By handing authority and responsibility to someone else will needs be better met? Will those needs not just be centralized and addressed within a far more dispassionate system?

I know there are real issues with poverty, oppression and disenfranchising. I also know that many are indifferent to these issues and we would rather see unified efforts to combat these problems, but I would rather have a leader who would champion these causes without asking to that the government be the savior.

If we cannot be held responsible to act on our own to nurture, care and support those in our care and around us we become an indifferent society. Already, we ignore so many because “there are programs for that.” Ask those who don’t qualify for said programs and see if they agree. When we continually take from the citizenry to fund these initiatives we not only take away the power to act locally, but we train generations that they need not care to because their government will act on their behalf.

I don’t dislike Obama, but I do dislike the notion that our nation’s ills can be solved if only the right progressive President were chosen- such high hopes can only be dashed. If we want to help children, the homeless, the ill, the disenfranchised act toward this each day – don’t wait on someone else and don’t wait for Novembers.