The Democratic Party
By Unknown

In the past eight years, we have seen all the profits of a booming economy.  We have seen the stock market at its peak, employment at its lowest, and a first time budget surplus.   In this election year, the champion of the new economy is Al Gore.  After being handed the reigns of the party by President Clinton, Gore purposes to keep the new economy while gaining some new programs off the new surplus.

The Gore Agenda:

Education- Gore wants to increase the credibility of the schools and create a performance card so that parents select the school best suited to their child's needs and hold schools accountable for student performance.  He also wants to help promote school choice by creating more charter schools throughout the nation.  Gore wants to keep professional teachers in the classroom by requiring rigorous testing for teachers.  He wants to invest in universal pre-school and in teacher pay to schools that will help increase teacher quality.  Gore has always been a big proponent of the use of Internet, and wants to help all schools access the World Wide Web.  Gore also presents a tax cut to help parents afford a student's college education.

Budget and Taxes- Gore's tag line for the budget is, "specialized tax cuts for the working family."  He wants to give a tax cut to seniors to help pay for prescription medication, he wants to give a tax cut to parents who have children in college to help pay for college, tax break for people with long care needs, and many other tax breaks.  Check his website for all the various tax cuts and budget ideas he has to offer.

Health Care- Gore wants to expand the CHIPS program to allow all children, regardless of the parents' income, to have some sort of health insurance. Al Gore would take Medicare and place it in a "Medicare lock box" so that taxes taken for Medicare will only be used for Medicare.  He also wants to help pay up to 50% of the prescription drugs, so seniors will not be forced to choose dinner or medication.

Social Security- by using long-term interests, he wants to help Social Security be available till atleast 2054.  He also wants to create tax-free accounts that if fully participated on, could earn up to $400,000 for retirement.

The Good- The status quo is on Gore's side.  He has worked along Clinton's side to help create the new economy that we all are enjoying today.  With Joseph Lieberman now as a runningmate, Gore has solved many challenges that he faced.  Lieberman brings along a charismatic personality, a person from a minority group and a critic of Clinton in the Lewinsky case.  Gore is also riding on the up side of the polls from a well-done convention.

The Bad- What will be crucial in this election is if Gore can escape the image of being Clinton's second hand man, and the true controller of the party.  He needs to make clear that he had a large part in the creation of the new economy.  He also needs to stray away from the bad Clinton ties such as the Lewinsky scandal.

The race toward November should be interesting, as there are a lot of completely different ideals and beliefs clashing head to head.  Now there is a new champion coming into his own to support the status quo.