What is unacceptable in a candidate?

Other than the ultimate - being a republican, what would put you off a candidate to the point that you wouldn't vote for him/her?

More than one of the options you listed would make me not want to vote for a candidate.

but I think that falls under "pet issues"

But "pet issues" is broad, so I explained further which pet issue was my litmus test.

I couldn't understand those who voted for pet issues. I was thinking of an issue like making sure the salmon are taken care of in the northwest. Couldn't understand how someone would put that over the basic foundation of our country, the Constitution, separation of church and state. We have it or we don't have a country. I don't see that as a 'pet issue'. I'm glad to see silliness didn't overrule common sense in that particular vote.

...I don't vote on the pet issues of the salmon kinds. I do consider separation of church and state a pet issue, though, because it is, well, the issue I care the most about, as well as the equivalent of desegregation for blacks. I don't expect a black to vote for Thurmond; for the same reason, I won't vote for Lieberman.

being a bush
being a republican

In a best of all worlds situation I would like a good person.
Now, I'm willing to settle for someone who is just not real evil.

Why would you not vote for an atheist, I speak as an unconventional theist myself, but I have no problems with voting for an open atheist, and I don't see why anyone else would either. The other two are obvious (opposed politics). But to not vote simply because of lack of belief in God(s) seems to me to strike of bigotry. Its like refusing to vote for a Christian or Muslim, as long as I like their politics I would vote for either one myself. Why limit the choices?

I think it carries over to the rest of ones thinking.

To tell the truth - i only said that to tease the original poster - gringo

but i do believe it.

Unless you live in a vacuum, every experience shapes you. That includes belief systems or morality systems. Joe Lieberman said in August of 2000 that he didn't think atheists could be moral people. There are a lot of atheists on this board, myself included, who reject that thinking.

Everyone is moral, but everyone is different in how they apply that morality. Where politicians stand on the issues will tell you a lot more about them than their religion or lack thereof.

I went with wrong position on pet issues: The big ones for me, prioritized, are

The economy: too many people are losing their jobs and there are no new decent-paying jobs being created. Cheap labor conservatism must be stopped. It hurts us all.

Health: I'd love universal health care. The present system costs employers way too much as the insurance industry runs it and they overcharge for everything. Manage it better and universal coverage can cost a lot less than selective coverage. Under the health heading is the ability to make my own decisions about health care without having someone else's religious belief system interfering. As in I decide how much of a risk to my life is acceptable and my reasons for having a procedure done are my own and my doctor's business.

The Bill of Rights and civil liberties in general: Ashcroft has got to be prevented from shredding what's left of our Constitution. It's getting to the point that any time someone disagrees politely with what the Bush Regime is doing, they get labeled a traitor. Our country is getting polarized and families have seen relationships crumble because of it. We do need to keep the discourse civil, but we do need to make damn sure that the Ashcrofts of the world don't prevail. And to protect freedom of speech, we must all speak up and make ourselves be heard.

Separation of church and state: It's in the Constitution, but there are people out there trying to force others to submit to their belief systems. That judge in Alabama who is refusing to obey the order to remove the 10 commandments from his courtroom. he's fighting this with state funds and blaming the people opposed to toppling the wall between church and state for wasting Alabama's money. For the record, I'm not bothered by public displays of religious symbols if multiple religious symbols from many religions are represented.

What the hell do you mean by that a "fundamental flaw in thinking" crap ??? Please, do educate me oh wise one - my thinking is fundamentally flawed, and my lack of belief in your chosen myth somehow has rendered the rest of my thoughts worthless ??

You've got your BIG balls on today... please, educate us poor crazy atheists, wont you ??

To say that people who interpret life in a logical way suffer from a "fundamental flaw" is such garbage. I would never blanket-smear the believers in the various superstition structures that way.

The only way atheists are flawed is that we don't have the sense to go through the motions and pretend that we believe, the way that most TV preachers do (I firmly believe that they are cynical opportunistic atheists deep down) It profits us little to not recycle the pablum that comforts so many.

I'd be willing to bet that many of the atheists here, including myself, humor their religious friends when they start talking about whatever religious theme. It's just so much easier than arguing about it - arguing about it is ultimately pointless for everyone.

Being rational?

Believing in things because there's evidence, scientific or logical, for them rather than because the bible says so?

Loving one's fellow human and not god (that's more humanistic, but still)?

Thinking that science is true?

Thinking?

Refusing to believe in that which requries pure faith?

BTW, let me interject with a personal attack. I have two people on my ignore list; both entered it after a series of offenses - one because he continuously bashed atheism, atheists, and separation of church and state, and the other because he was an assinine socialist with paranoid tendencies who sounded like Karl Marx with without the intelligence. I also have a waiting list of people I tolerate at times but still may put them on ignore if they piss me.

You never were on that waiting list. It takes a pretty serious idiocy to get on my ignore list withotu any other offense. Your post does it. So, fortuantely, beginning 3 minutes from now, I won't have to read your bigoted, narrow-minded, dark-age posts. See ya when I have fun in hell and you bore yourself till eternity in heaven...

in the same category? Twice. I might question the integrity of someone that is having affairs, but not so of someone for being homosexual.

I couldn't vote because there were more than one categories that would make an unacceptable candidate.

I was so glad to have Bill Clinton in the White House and I still think he was a great president but I think he did his supporters a diservice with the Monica thing.

He kneww that there was a group that was out to get him and that he was vulnerable in that area. Even though we technically won the election, I think the moral backlash really hurt us.

I would not be supportive of a man/woman who had affairs in his background.

witch-hunts, than I am about Clinton's momentary lapse in judgment. It is NONE OF OUR BUSINESS. I don't want to know about any pol's sex life.

I don't care if Clinton, Kennedy, or Ah-nold cheats on his wife. It's between the politician and the SO; if the SO doesn't object, or doesn't object srongly enough to break off the marriage, then we should all move on.

Because they are both none of our damn business. Having an affair may be more "wrong" than homosexuality, but that really depends on a lot of things. What if the candidate has an "open marriage" with his/her wife(as I suspect has long been the case with the Clintons)? Then nobody is being betrayed, no promises broken. Anyway, it's not for us to judge whether an affair is wrong or not. That's repuke thinking. The same goes for homosexuality - none of our business. Neither of these things reflect on the candidate's honesty or competence, IMO.

Never having to work day in their life

much as I was offended by calling civil rights a pet.

Since I refuse to consider preventive war a "pet issue," I had to vote for other.

did it for me too.OTHER.

That doesn't minimize their validity or importance at all.

The Roe v. Wade is only of minimal interest to me, for example. It falls pretty low on my priority list. It is extremely high on the lists of many feminists and bible-thumpers. I don't think they are wrong for obsessing on that issue, and I don't think I'm wrong for being more interested in other issues - particularly labor and civil rights issues. It's all a matter of priorities.

That leaves out Kerry and Lieberman.

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Leave me alone.

Both parties voted practically unanimously to condemn Newdow vs. Congress. The decision was condemned 99-0 in the Senate (and would've been 100-0 had Jesse Helms not been in hospital) and 426-5 in the House.

for religious reasons or at the behest of foreign governments for their own aggrandizement.

I don't care if a candidate gets off with a flock of ptarmigans while wearing a feather boa.

You've characterized all lies on the campaign trail as 'little' but I don't know why. Surely the campaign would be someplace you'd see big lies. And even little lies, if they start adding up, don't seem so little.

If they cant respect the 2nd, then they proably don't respect any other right.

I'd have to vote against them no matter what just because we have to get the Republicans out of the majority positions.

It's as simple as that.

If it's a primary, then being conservative (like a Republican) is it.