How do you get real information about a candidate, the kind that helps you decide how to vote, reliable information about what the candidate stands for? Of course you can go to the candidate’s web site or read campaign materials, but that isn’t going to be objective. No matter who the candidate is, those materials are designed to be a commercial. You can listen to the news, but we’ve all seen how biased mainstream media has become, especially in this presidential race, where news reports began leaving out some candidates’ names well before the primaries began. The so-called news coverage is at least in part an infomercial. You can do in-depth research on your own — but who has time for that?
There’s one other source of information you may not know about: Project Vote Smart is a non-profit organization that researches and provides objective information about election choices in the U.S. Read more about the project here. At the Project Vote Smart website, you can view any presidential candidate’s voting record, synopses of what they voted on, and other information that will help you to make an informed decision. To learn more about the current presidential candidates, just go to the “Current Candidates” page, click on the “President” link, and you’ll find a listing of all the 2008 Presidential Candidates. Click on a candidate’s name to view information about the candidate’s background and experience, and find links to other information, including the candidate’s voting record.
I haven’t looked very far into the information provided there on third party candidates. I clicked on “All Candidates” and saw that there is limited information there about some of the third party candidates, but the one I clicked on didn’t have complete background data, so the information found at the site may be most valuable to those who generally vote either Democrat or Republican.
