College Newspapers Endorse Barack Obama

The Campus Press of Colorado University; The California Aggie of the University of California, Davis; The Chanticleer of Jacksonville State University; The Santa Clara of Santa Clara University; and the Trinity Tripod of Trinity College (CT) have all endorsed Barack Obama.

Here is the endorsement from The Santa Clara:

Obama: Best candidate for America's future

Issue date: 1/31/08 Section: Opinion

Originally published: 1/30/08 at 11:35 PM PST

For nearly eight years, Americans have watched TV in horror and opened newspapers with dread as the country has forsaken its ideals -- and its people.

Every day troops die in a war begun by lies. America has become the curiosity of the international community, if not the laughing stock. The struggling economy has even spurred the Feds to intervention and led politicians to throw around the word "recession."

It's safe to say that Americans are ready for a change of pace.

And Senator Barack Obama is the perfect person to set this pace.

Perhaps it's Obama's claim that he believes "in what the country can be" that has inspired such an outpouring of support for him. Indeed, this image of what the country could be under Obama's leadership is an enticing one.

As president, Obama hopes to end the war and have all combat personnel home within 16 months of his election. And rather than promoting a transnational war on terror as a selling point of his candidacy, Obama has vowed to work to increase regional diplomacy in tense areas like the Middle East.

With less money put toward the war effort, Obama hopes to provide a $4,000 yearly tax credit for college students, a number that seems small in light of the $33,000 that is Santa Clara's tuition, but a very real sum for students attending state and community colleges.

Obama also has plans to reform the ailing health care system. He looks toward universal coverage that will serve as a form of quality control for private systems that charge too much to do too little.

As tempting as all this may seem, Obama's supporters are less enthralled by his policies than his personal invitation to join him in this "movement for change."

For the first time since John F. Kennedy, a presidential candidate is offering the American people an active role in shaping the nation's destiny. Lamenting the ways Washington, D.C., has alienated the American people, Obama promises to involve citizens in federal government.

And after all, isn't that what all freedom-loving and democracy-trusting Americans want -- to work with their chosen leader as "one people, reaching for what's possible"?