by Igor Derysh
 In the lead-up to the February 5 New York Primary, the Office of Student Life and Governmental Relations and Scepter each polled Kingsborough students to see which way Kingsborough will swing on Super-Duper Tuesday.
The Office of Student Life and Governmental Relations held a Straw Poll of 147 students in the Breezeway and found that the majority of Kingsborough students are leaning towards Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton with a few going for Rudy Giuliani.
Of the 147 students who participated, 65 voted for Barack Obama, 47 voted for Hillary Clinton and 16 voted for Rudy Giuliani. In the distance was John Edwards who received just three votes while John McCain, Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich received two votes apiece.
The Scepter also polled 85 people and found similar results. Of the 85 participants polled, 39 said that they would vote for Hillary Clinton while 31 said that they would vote for Barack Obama, though most admitted that their support for the candidate is only moderate and might change before the primary rolls around. Also receiving votes in the survey were Rudy Giuliani who received eight votes, John Edwards who got four votes, Mitt Romney received three votes and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee got just one vote.
Besides their preferred candidate, the Scepter survey also asked participants to rank which issues are most important to them in choosing which candidate they will vote for. The survey found that almost all students believed that the most important issues that their candidate must agree with them on are education, the war in Iraq and the economy rather than social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage and illegal immigration.
While students claimed that a candidate’s position on the important issues was the main influence in deciding which candidate they chose, many admitted that they weren’t sure or did not know their candidate’s positions. With that in mind, here is a basic rundown of the major candidates’ platforms and how they intend to deal with foreign and domestic issues:
Barack Obama:
The War in Iraq: Pull all troops out of Iraq within 16 months engaging Iraqi leaders in an aggressive diplomatic effort.
Healthcare: Expansion of the Medicaid and SCHIP programs. Mandatory coverage for children. Increased efforts to work with individual states to drive down the price of insurance nationwide.
Education: More emphasis on early care and education for toddlers. Reform the No Child Left Behind Act in order to help struggling schools rather than punish them.
Economy: Tax relief for 150 million working Americans by providing a tax credit of up to $500 per working person. Tax relief for parents who are responsibly paying child support. Bring more Americans into the global economy by working to keep more jobs within the U.S. rather than outsourcing them.
Hillary Clinton:
The War in Iraq: A phased redeployment of troops to begin within the first 60 days of her presidency. Take a role as a mediator between the sectarian factions in Iraq.
Healthcare: A tax credit program to help families who have a hard time affording health insurance.
Education: Improve early childhood education and Headstart programs. Get rid of No Child Left Behind and commit more money to at-risk schools.
Economy: Lower taxes for “middle class” families. Ensure that labor unions play a large part in sustaining the economy.
John Edwards:
The War in Iraq: Withdrawal of all combat troops within ten months and prohibit permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq. Put pressure on surrounding nations to take a more involved role in the stabilization of Iraq.
Healthcare: Work to lower insurance costs and helping families who can’t afford insurance cover their costs. Require employers to either cover or help finance employee health insurance. Expand the Medicaid and SCHIP programs.
Education: Improve early childhood education. Raise pay for teachers by up to $15,000. Overhaul the No Child Left Behind Act and create better measures for measuring student progress.
Economy: Increase minimum wage to $9.50 by 2012. Create more job opportunities by supporting small business. Protect Americans against foreclosure in an unstable economy. Create a “savings economy” by matching savings of up to $500 per year.
John McCain:
The War in Iraq: Increase the number of troops in Iraq in order to provide security and training for the Iraqi Army. Work with the Iraqis to create a more equitable distribution of government resources.
Healthcare: Protect the healthcare assistance programs already in place. Promote competition among healthcare providers to drive down insurance costs.
Education: Promote the No Child Left Behind Act. Allow parents to use school vouchers to send their kids to private and religious schools.
Economy: Cut taxes by $60 billion for “middle-class” families. Stop pork-barrel spending and other government wasteful spending. Protect
Social Security by supplementing it with personal accounts. Promote opening markets and creating new economic opportunity.
Mike Huckabee:
The War in Iraq: Do whatever it takes to win in Iraq. Support a regional summit to encourage surrounding nations to become more militarily and financially committed to stabilizing Iraq.
Healthcare: Encourage the market to drive down healthcare costs. Allow people more control of their healthcare options. Work with Congress, the private sector and healthcare providers to overhaul the healthcare system.
Education: Push states to develop their own measures of student progress rather than use those in the No Child Left Behind Act. Support music and art programs and fund extracurricular programs to get kids more excited about school.
Economy: Abolish the IRS and create a fair tax, a tax on sales rather than income. Bring back the line item veto in order to control wasteful Congressional spending.
Mitt Romney:
The War in Iraq: Add at least 100,000 more troops. Spend an additional $30-$40 billion annually on military spending.
Healthcare: Allow people to buy insurance across state lines. Promote “innovation” of Medicaid. Allow people more freedom of healthcare choices rather than be reliant on the government.
Education: Encourage states to take more control of their school systems rather than rely on the federal government. Allow parents to use school vouchers. Tax credit for homeschooled students.
Economy: Eliminate taxes on interest, dividends and capital gains for middle-class families. Implement National Tort Reform to try to end frivolous lawsuits.
Rudy Giuliani:
The War in Iraq: Work with the Iraqi government to stabilize Iraq while continuing with the “Surge” strategy already in place.
Healthcare: Promote transparency among health care providers. Reform the Medical Liability legal system to prevent frivolous lawsuits. Encourage states to improve the cost and quality of healthcare without relying on the federal government.
Education: Establish a federal school voucher program. Promote progress in the No Child Left Behind Program.
Economy: Impose fiscal discipline to cut wasteful government spending. Require government agencies to identify up to 20% in spending reductions in their annual budgets. Set guidelines to prevent taxes from going up after the Bush tax cuts expire.
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