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From the time the presidential started almost two years ago, we have been inundated with many candidates, but one by one they have been eliminated and the playing field has been cleared of all competitors except for the Obama team for the Democrats and the McCain team for the Republicans. At least now we know what our choices are.

The one thing that is bothering some people who will vote in November is the fact that we still do not have a really clear picture as to where the candidates stand on many issues. This might be because the real issues are often clouded over by other topics that we might not even consider relevant to their campaigns.

Smoke screens as they are referred to, can be handy items for politicians when they are running for an office in the government. They will use stories about what they have done in the past or some family thing to keep our attention on that instead of the important things we want to know about like what they are going to go about the fuel crisis, the economy, or the housing market.

So far in this presidential race we have heard endlessly about John McCain and his stint as a POW. Now no one should downplay the significance of his service to our country as a soldier, but really, he is not by far the only soldier who endured this and it does not mean that it makes him more qualified to be president than any other soldier who experienced the same thing.

As for his running mate, Sarah Palin, she probably is a wonderful soccer mom, or was it hockey? The point is what that have to do with her qualifications as a vice president, or president if anything happened to McCain? Do we believe that a mother of five who has to deal with ball practices, newborn babies, and teenager problems will have time to run the country as adequately as someone who has less personal responsibilities? Not meaning to be disrespectful to working mothers, but they can tell you how stressful it can be to do this job alone, much less try to be vice president of the strongest nation in the world at the same time!

The democrats have their smoke screens too, such as what Obama did in the housing projects, but this at least does show something he did for the better good. It would be better if all the candidates stick to the issues that mean something. Of course, we do want to know who these people are and what kind of people they are, but what we really want to know is how are they going to help our country today?

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Barack Obama is a Leo, which is not surprising as it is often the sign of a famous man - and especially a famous politician. He is the Junior United States Senator and the only African American serving in the U.S. Senate. He is, of course, also running for President of the United States. His birthday is August 4, 1961.

Like many famous people, Barack Obama has a stellium in his chart, which means three or more planets in his house or sign. Not only does Obama have the Sun in Leo but also the Lillith, Mars, Uranus and his North Node. This is in the seventh house of social activity so it is not surprising that Barack is such a popular candidate. His ability to swing people over to his way of thinking is completely made apparent by the bulk of these planets in his chart.

Barack Obama is a good public speaker with a natural popularity with others. Having his moon in Gemini indicates this. This man is probably also a great writer. Obama’s ascendant is in Aquarius, which bodes very well for a successful career as president. It defines his role as a great visionary.

The planets in his charts are mostly in fire signs, which would endow him with courage, nobility, and also a great deal of energy. He would be an energetic, flexible and likeable President.

The weakest part of his chart is the Venus in Cancer. This can mean addiction, jealousy, and oversensitivity to the opposite sex. However, it can also mean a real ability to empathize with others. Barack Obama is already well known for his addiction to cigarettes.

One of the oddest things in his chart is that he has both Saturn and Jupiter in the twelfth house. This indicates an individual that is destined to be a heavy individual of some sort. Jupiter is in Aquarius, which can mean certain instability emotionally or mentally, or issues to do with the past. Saturn is retrograde in Capricorn, which is not a good omen for anybody. For a Presidential leader, it can mean an assassination or corruption. In the twelfth house, it can mean a slide down the mountain of achieve due to a big humiliation of some kind.

Weirdly, Barack Obama may have a bit of psychic ability. He has Neptune in the ninth house, where it is exalted. This means spiritual abilities. However, it can also mean addiction, codependency and a tendency to be overwhelmed by his feelings every now and then. Venus in Cancer doubles the impact of this. This is a very sensitive individual who, despite Obama’s calm outward demeanor, probably inwardly rages. That said, he is a bit of an iceberg. Barack has sensitivities and intuitive beliefs that the general public will never ever see. What we see instead is a well spoken, charming and very organized man.

SpiritNow.com is the new website of Sylvia Browne - featuring content on psychics, astrology, angels, dreams, feng shui, and love. Visit SpiritNow.com today for a free psychic reading.

John McCain has an almost perfect triad of planets for a world leader. He was born August 29, 1936 in Canal zone, Panama. His Sun is in sensible Virgo, his moon is in practical Capricorn, and his ascendant (or rising sign as it is also sometimes known) is in fair-minded Libra. Put together, this makes an individual that is a bit cold, but would take care to always make the right decision. This is because in these key astrological positions, he has planetary positions that signify someone who is careful, thoughtful, and makes decisions devoid of emotions or prejudices whenever he can.

Virgos make good leaders because they tend to be honest and humble. They are also humble, efficient and notorious for just getting the job done. As President, he is likely to be a stickler for detail and he will keep his staff in line. He also deals in nothing but facts. There will be no conjectures, suppositions or lies in this administration. Virgos like to get to the bottom of a matter. However, he is also likely to be as hard on himself, as Virgos tend to be a little self-critical.

The drawback of being a Virgo is that sometimes others see you as a little dull, dogmatic or stuffy. You are so helpful and so busy that others will take advantage of you. Some, including the nightly talk show hosts, may see him as being a bit too serious.

He might also have a tendency to focus on the flaws in things rather on the positive, but this comes out of the Virgo compulsion to fix things. There is no doubt that an administration run under McCain will be run fairly and with as little corruption as possible.

That moon in Capricorn also denotes a workaholic, and also someone who is not afraid to take the weight of the world on his shoulders. This is an individual who is not afraid to try and solve problems such as poverty. This is also a very humble placement and he may not often show how much he cares or his deeper emotions to prevent others from perceiving him as being out of control.

This Capricorn moon also probably is what allowed him to survive his trials as a POW. Rather than cause a crack in his character, this horrible experience probably served to strengthen his character instead.

His sun also trines Uranus. This means that he is not afraid to explore new solutions and ideas and put them into action. He is not as conservative as he seems and does not fear implementing changes.

His Libra ascendant makes him a natural diplomat. This is a reasonable, tolerant and fair individual. He will always agree to disagree, rather than got to war. He will excel at maintaining harmonious relationships with other countries and world leader. Cooperation, fairness and friendliness are high on his list of values and he could help restore the maligned reputation of the United States.

SpiritNow.com is the new website of Sylvia Browne - featuring content on psychics, astrology, angels, dreams, feng shui, and love. Visit SpiritNow.com today for a free psychic reading.

Hawaii is especially proud of our new president, Barack Obama. He was born here and spent many of his formative years living in Honolulu. We believe this time spent in Hawaii had an indelible effect on the formation of his character, because the history of Hawaii makes this place unique.

Of course, his other international experiences, such as living in Indonesia with his mother and stepfather, must also have had a big effect. Obama knows from his playground days that even those who speak another language and follow another faith are just folks like the rest of us.

And, even in Hawaii, he did have to grapple with his own identity. There are not a lot of African-Americans in the Islands, and the culture that a half-black child would experience anywhere on the U.S. Mainland barely exists here.

Besides that, of course, Obama’s father was from Africa, so he didn’t have the black American extended family that might have given him that sense of identity to balance what he experienced with his white grandparents. He had to seek out connections with the black American community.

But Obama grew up in a place with a unique take on racial issues. Hawaii Public Radio commentator Tony Oliver pointed out that, in Hawaii, “Our new president is a member of a minority, just like the rest of us. His self-confidence comes not from being a minority, but from being one of many minorities.”

Oliver ended his commentary with this sentence: “Barack Obama is our first hapa president.” If you are not from Hawaii, that probably means nothing to you. In Hawaii, it means a lot. Many Islanders are “hapa.” The word is Hawaiian for “half,” and its use tells a lot about the history of Hawaii.

Early on, Caucasian sailors married Hawaiian women, creating the first hapa children. Later, plantation owners brought in Chinese immigrants to work in the sugar cane fields, and soon there were Hawaiian-Chinese children. Intermarriage has been going on ever since, as various ethnic groups arrived to work on the plantations.

Now, it is not uncommon for someone to tell you his genealogy includes Hawaiian, Chinese, Portuguese, French, Danish, Korean and Puerto Rican–or any other combination. Thousands of people call themselves “chop suey,” or an old-fashioned word from the multicultural May Day festivals of my youth: Cosmopolitan.

Our Island lifestyle and values are grounded in the Hawaiian host culture, which invented the concept of “aloha” and demonstrated it by welcoming people from all over the world.

Many of us are related by marriage to someone of another race; it’s hard to really hate another ethnic group when your favorite aunt happens to belong to that group. We share our food, our holiday customs, and the “local” style of talk and dress, and because we live on isolated islands, we have to rely on each other for survival.

Years ago, I appeared on a panel with two young black men who were representing the Black Power movement. We spent some time together afterward, and I asked them to suggest a book I could read, because I just didn’t get it. I had spent much of my life living where the lines between races were blurred, more gray (or perhaps rainbow colored) than black and white.

They suggested I read The Autobiography of Malcolm X. I did, and then I understood better where they were coming from.

Mainlanders, accustomed to the sharp lines drawn between racial groups, probably have the same kind of bewilderment about race in Hawaii. One of the best things to come out of the Obama presidency would be to make the rest of the world more aware of how race relations work in Hawaii and how we manage to get along here.

We Islanders hope our new president comes home often. We will welcome him, but we will also try to give him enough space to enjoy the simple beauties of Hawaii. We have a custom of leaving celebrity visitors alone to relax; take note, national press, and back off as President Obama gets together with his high school basketball buddies, goes body surfing and stops to smell the plumerias.

In Hawaii, Obama can re-charge with the special energy that fed his soul in his growing-up years. This is the place that gave him the openness and the confidence to begin to heal those hard-edged divisions that plague our nation and our planet. May he visit often, and may the world watch and learn that Hawaii is more than just another pretty place.

Learn more from award-winning Hawaii author Jill Engledow about the history of Hawaii at her website, http://www.islandlife101.com.