Hillary Clinton Elected President in 2008 - Assignment Example

English 101 26 November 2007 Hillary Clinton will be elected president in 2008 The next presidential election is in 2008. In this election, Americans will be able to choose the candidate that they will want to lead the country for the next four years. The candidate that has the best chance of winning this election is Hillary Rodham Clinton. Clinton has plans to end the Iraq War, stop global warming, provide a universal health care system for Americans, reduce America's dependence on foreign oil, and provide many benefits for the middle class. She is currently the front runner in the polls for the Democratic Primary, and most Americans have forgotten about most of the problems and scandals that occurred during the years that Bill Clinton was in office. The Iraq war has become unpopular with many Americans. Although the official cause for the war in Iraq was to free Iraqis from the rule of Saddam Hussein, fight terrorism, and eliminate the "weapons of mass destruction" that were supposedly being stockpiled by Hussein, inspectors were not able to confirm the existence of those weapons and a large number of Iraqis see the US Army as an occupation force, not as an army of liberation. The information that linked Hussein to Al-Queda has been proven to be false. Many believe that the war was really over control of Iraq's oil resources. The war originally seemed to be successful, as the US Military defeated Iraq's official army quickly and occupied Baghdad; however, there is currently a continuous civil war in Iraq that seems to be unwinnable by America. The only reliable method of winning guerilla wars is genocide, which no one in America supports. The US Army is becoming overextended. There have also been accusations and proved cases of torture in American prison camps, and the price of oil has been constantly rising in the past few years. Hillary Clinton has stated clearly that if she becomes the president, she will end it- "If President Bush does not end the war, when Hillary Clinton is president, she will. Her three-step plan would bring our troops home, work to bring stability to the region, and replace military force with a new diplomatic initiative to engage countries around the world in securing Iraq's future. Hillary has been fighting every day in the Senate to force the president to change course. And today she described how she would bring the war to an end" (Clinton, 2007). Clinton's three-part plan for ending the war includes setting up a gradual redeployment plan, attempting to broker peace between the parties involved in the Iraqi Civil War, and attempting to set up alliances with other nations in the region to help stabilize Iraq. A major problem that is facing the world in the twenty-first century is global warming. Hillary Clinton offers a good plan to slow the progress of global warming. The rate of global warming could accelerate rapidly as positive feedback loops occur. Many citizens are concerned about the effects of global warming, as the process could be extremely destructive to America and the world. The level on concern has been increasing over time-"Most Americans blame emissions from cars and industrial plants as the primary cause of global warming and believe the United States should reduce levels even if other countries don't, a survey shows. Fifty-six percent of poll respondents said the phenomenon of global warming has been proven, and can be largely blamed on human endeavors, such as power plants and factories, according to the CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll. In comparison, 21 percent of those surveyed claimed global warming problems are caused either by natural changes or are unproven. Sixty-six percent of Americans believe the United States should do what it can to reduce global warming, even if other nations ignore it. This compares with 52 percent of respondents who believed that way in 2001" ( Poll shows Americans getting more concerned about global warming, 2007). Dependance on foreign oil imports is also a situation that scares many Americans. "Centered on a cap and trade system for carbon emissions, stronger energy and auto efficiency standards and a significant increase in green research funding, Hillary's plan will reduce America's reliance on foreign oil and address the looming climate crisis. Setting ambitious targets, the plan would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050 to avoid the worst effects of global warming, and cut foreign oil imports by two-thirds from 2030 projected levels, more than 10 million barrels per day" (Clinton, 2007). This plan would create many jobs for middle class Americans and cause the economy to become less based on carbon use. Alternative energy sources such as wind, solar, and geothermal might be developed more heavily, and the amounts of fossil fuels used could drop. Energy efficency would also be encouraged. This plan is a good one, due to the fact that at the present time, the earth could be running out of oil and other fossil fuels. One of Clinton's other proposals is to provide health care for all Americans. This is important, as millions of Americans currently lack health insurance, and the costs of medicine have been rising rapidly in recent years. Her plan promises to reduce health care costs, control the insurance companies, and provide better health care for nearly all Americans. The public health situation in America has not been impressive in recent years. The United States now ranks thirty-eighth in life expectancy and has the thirty-third lowest infant mortality rate. Countries with a higher life expectancy than the US include Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Cuba and some countries with a lower infant mortality rate are Brunei and New Caledonia. A large segment of the American population is dissatisfied with the American health care system. In an article by Chris Fleming it was noted that "in an April 2006 survey sponsored by Harvard and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation: -43 percent of Americans surveyed named high costs as one of the two most important health care issues for government to address; -34 percent flagged the lack of insurance and access.-15 percent named Medicare and the drug benefit as a distant third most important health care issues, -11 percent cited low-quality care" (Fleming 2006). It also noted that "However, health care 'ranks higher today than many other national problems often identified as being very important,' Blendon and coauthors point out. Specifically, health care still outranks education, the environment (including global warming), Social Security, poverty, and crime" (Blendon; cited by Fleming, 2006). Hillary Clinton's plans will be important in solving these three major problems, and she also has proposals that will help America in other ways. She will solve problems that most Americans are concerned about, and will probably win the election in 2008 and become America's forty-forth president. Works Cited Fleming, Chris. "PUBLIC OPINION: Americans Concerned About Health Costs, Access to Care". Health Affairs. 17 Oct. 2006. Project HOPE-The People-to-People Organization. 26 Nov. 2007 . Hillary for President. 2007. Hillary Clinton for President. 26 Nov. 2007 . Iraq War as Unpopular as Vietnam: Experts. 23 Mar. 2006. Agence France Presse. 26 Nov. 2007 "Poll shows Americans getting more concerned about global warming". CNN. 20 Oct. 2007. Cable News Network, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. 26 Nov. 2007 . Smiley, Travis. "Healthcare". All-American Presidential Forums on PBS. 2007. The Smiley Group, Inc. 26 Nov. 2007 . World Population Prospects The 2006 Revision. 2007. United Nations, Department of Population and Social Affairs. 26 Nov. 2007 . Read More