Party chairmen weigh in for presidential candidates

(Editor’s note: For the issue on the date of the Great Maybe A Debate in Oxford, Panola County’s party chairmen have submitted, at our request, endorsements of their parties’ nominees.)

As I sat at Invesco Field in Denver, Colo., listening to Sen. Barack Obama’s acceptance speech, I was surrounded by a sea of signs supporting “Change.”

It was surreal, probably the first time in my life that I knew I was witnessing history in the making. Barack Obama accepted the Democratic Party’s nomination for president of the United States. But what would this “change” mean to me and the people of Mississippi?

I look around our county today and I see people, hard-working people, my friends, working two jobs, sometimes three, just to cover the increase in gas prices and the increases in grocery prices brought by the skyrocketing fuel costs.

I remember a time when all you had to do was work hard and you could make it, where there was truly hope that your hard work and determination were all you needed. Now, it seems, our economy is in turmoil, unemployment is on the rise, small and large businesses are failing left and right, we are spending billions in Iraq and families in Mississippi and across the country can’t make ends meet.

The strength of this country, its powerhouse, is middle class working people. It’s time to support our strengths again and offer tax incentives to all Americans, not just the elite. While AIG is requesting an $85 billion bailout, we are doing nothing to support our small businesses or to make healthcare affordable for every American family. Barack Obama and Joe Biden want to support those who make this country strong.

Supporting our troops overseas and when they return home, as well as providing a time to bring them home to their families, is paramount to the men and women in service and to the financial well-being of our country.

Join me in watching the presidential debate Friday Sept. 26. Our country simply cannot survive John McCain as president and four more years of the same, failed Bush policies that have damaged our economy, damaged our foreign relations and left us in a never-ending war. Mississippi families can’t afford that.

We need Change. We need Barack Obama as our next president.