Just In …All Future Cleveland Plain Dealer Editions To Be Published In French!

( Juste En... Toutes les Éditions de Palladium De Futur À éditer En français !)

Then, “Pee's on our heads and tells us its raining” as the reason! What a bunch of overeducated and under- testosteroned COWARDS!

For president . . .

The voters know the issues and understand the stakes; we cannot imagine they need further advice about the men Tuesday, October 26, 2004 In a year of deep political divisions, this newspaper's opinion section is experienc ing deep divisions of its own.

After nearly four years spent watching George W. Bush as president, and after a year of watching Sen. John Kerry campaign to oust him, we have decided not to add one more potentially polarizing voice to a poisoned debate. We make no endorsement for president this year.

Our readers certainly should not take that as an invitation to walk away from the civic responsibility of casting a ballot for the man they believe best suited to facing the challenges of the Oval Office. This is, rather, a recognition that whatever can be known about each candidate is already widely known - and that whatever questions remain about each candidate will still remain when the polls close a week from today. Americans know more about Bush.

They know that he and his aides seriously underestimated the quality and intensity of the resistance to the occupation of Iraq by troops from the United States, Great Britain and an assortment of coalition partners.

They know that on the home front, he has insisted on tax cuts in the teeth of a growing federal deficit, instituted a color-coded terrorist threat alert system that Americans have come largely to ignore because they consider it useless, and oversold a Medicare prescription package that bears all of the earmarks of a budget-busting disappointment.

They know that he has done these things in the atmosphere of an administration that prefers to hold its own secrets close even as, in the name of homeland security, it proposes new and sometimes disturbing avenues of government intrusion into the lives of ordinary people.

The outstanding questions apply far more to Kerry.

His critics' charges that he operates more out of political expediency than deeply held principle resonate with many people for good reason.

He presents himself as an answer to the president's mistakes in fighting terrorism, for example, but has yet to tell precisely what he would have done differently.

Domestically, Kerry proclaims an ambitious agenda. It is hard to see, though, how he can accomplish it without resorting to tax increases that cut far more deeply into the middle class than he is willing to admit.

He speaks only in the vaguest terms, and leaves the impression of a man who consciously builds an escape clause into his every utterance.

Neither candidate has managed to articulate a plausible exit strategy from Iraq. That lack of a discernible difference on what should be the pivotal issue means that this election has become, first and foremost, a referendum on Bush's conduct as president.

We believe our readers are perfectly capable of judging that conduct for themselves and deciding whether Bush's flaws bother them more than Kerry's ambiguities.

The decision not to endorse in this race was not easily taken. A majority of the editorial board favored Kerry, but after long and difficult deliberations, it was decided that the better path would be to sit this one out.

We prefer, this year, to call voters' attention to the races in which we believe our endorsements can be more helpful.

Since the end of July, members of the editorial board have interviewed 117 candidates for federal, state and local offices across Northeast Ohio. In dozens of races, particularly the judgeships, our endorsements weigh the histories, qualifications and positions of candidates who otherwise would merely be names on a ballot to most voters.

In this contentious presidential election, we saw no opportunity to serve the purpose of informing readers beyond what the news pages and their own civic diligence have done.

In the end, we did not feel comfortable giving either candidate what would essentially come down to bragging rights.

We believe our readers are perfectly capable of making an informed, rational decision by their own lights, and we strongly urge them to do so.

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