Ok... so let's get the housekeeping  out of the way. I am a married , white male. I am the creative director for a media company. I am 43 years old and live in California, in a small beachfront community. We have a combined gross income around 175k. My wife is a research associate working in San Francisco. While I seem to be blessed with good health right now, she has recently been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. We own a small condo. Well, the bank owns it. We both have university degrees. We have 2 pomeranians and a cat. We love music, food and walks on the beach cocktails until last call. We own a couple of MacBook Pros, an iPhone and a few iPods. We have no kids, but sometimes really, really want them.

So why is all this crap important? My hope is that you will see some of your life in our life, and the dialogue here will become more relevant to you, as the issues that we will be looking at will affect (effect?) you in the same ways. My wife has a disease. So the candidate's platform for healthcare, stem cell research and insurance will be extremely important to us. We live in California. My world is very different culturally than those living in Alabama. So my opinions will be varied. Duh.

Why did I decide to do this? I was driving home from my father's house. He had just helped me (I helped him, sort of)  repair my wife's car. I was driving thru the Salinas Valley listening to KGO radio and Willie Brown was speaking with I think Ronn Owens. They were talking about the cadidates for election and someone called in and lambasted Willie for saying that Barack Obama was well qualified to become President of the United States. Willie then pointed out that he was the editor of the Harvard Law Review, which in and of itself is a pretty incredible feat. He also went to Columbia University. He was a civil rights lawyer, and taught constitutional law.

Now this isnt a vote for Obama. But it showed me what I did not know. I knew dick about this guy. And I know even less about the republican candidates. So i decided to find out for myself who these candidates are, and then, hopefully, I will be able to cast my vote in Novemeber for a predient that I want to be in office.

My wife is a pretty smart chick. She is unapologetic that she does not vote. She believes that voting with out the facts is worse than not voting at all. So this year, we are going to gather our facts, read some stuff, form some opinions and cast our vote. With any luck I may just get her to write here as well.

With a first push, the ship is launched. Welcome aboard. I hope you stay for while.