Barack Obama is not qualified to be the next president of the US.

This debate is not about who is better or worse. You picked the topic of whether or not Obama is qualified to be president so please debate on the topic. I will address your points against Obama as I consider myself knowledgeable on the subject but quit trying to change the debate. 1. Talking The issue is whether talking to "insane" leaders is bad. I agree that I think what Iran is doing is bad and that what they are doing (whether it is funding terrorists or sending their own equipment in) should be an act of war. I still don't see how refusing to talk to Iran is beneficial. I laid out my cost benefit approach and all you rebutted with was "I refuse to parlay". That's your opinion but in debate we try to convince others and facts are generally a good way of going about this. If we don't talk with people, we can't resolve the situation w/o war. If we talk there is no harm but there is a possible benefit of avoiding war. 2. Al Quaeda I understand your points but I don't think you read my arguments. You stated that "al-Quaeda in Iraq is an imminent threat and must be dealt with. It must be dealt with not through slow withdrawal, which would give the al-Qaeda a monumental propaganda victory, but through perseverance." First off, you fail to explain why slow withdrawal is going to give a monumental propaganda victory. If anything I'd argue that it'd have an opposite affect. We can fend off al quaeda w/ ever decreasing troops therefore they are losing. And if perseverance means another us committing vietnam where we measure success exclusively by the number of deaths we inflict then I hope Al Quaeda wins. We should measure success based on what is best for America. Killing terrorists may be good but if we could kill a million terrorists for 1,000 american lives and if one million terrorists on there own would kill only 500 american lives, we are being short changed w/ perseverance. Obama advocates a flexible system of slow withdrawal that is based on what troops we need In Iraq at the moment. Mccain does the same thing but phrases it differently. This is the one course of action that makes sense as we are basing success on what is best for America. Mccain and Obama have the same plan in this aspect. Mccain thinks we don't have enough troops but he doesn't want to commit a million of them so we maximize terrorist deaths. Mccain thinks we'll have a bigger benefit from adding more troops than is saved by withdrawal. Obama thinks we have too many troops and the cost of american lives is not worth the benefit added. But both base their assumption on the "whats best for America" model and not the "kill all terrorists ever everywhere" neocon model. And yes, the success of the surge is based on what the surge did. We defined success as giving Iraq a stable time to develop institutions. This didn't happen. Therefore the original goal of the surge was failed. Good things may have happened from the surge but the original goal was a failure. 3. Experience First I want to address a common assumption. In the Illinois senate, people vote present for many reasons. If they like a bill as a whole but dislike parts they vote present. If the party tells them to vote present, they vote present. If the candidate wants to not draw political heat from others he can also vote present. I don't deny Obama voted present sometimes so he wouldn't draw fire but often he voted present for the first two reasons. If anything, I think this makes him more experienced as we don't want a president who will ignore the realities of the world and veto or not veto a bill based on his own moral standing. If a bill would piss off turkey enough to make them not let us use their airbases (like the armenian genocide bill) I want a president who wouldn't pass the bill as I want a president who balances America's interests and maximizes utility. Sure the Armenian genocide happened but I wouldn't let more of our troops die just so we can rub it in turkey's faces. Obama opposed the Kyl-Lieberman amendment which gave Bush the authority to increase force in iraq to counter Iran (without congress declaring war on Iran first) and he supports talking to leaders and he has made many diplomatic visits to other countries. He also introduced two bills that dealt with WMD/arms smuggling and to stop nuclear weapon buildup (he did this with Sen Hagel). Also the pres has so little impact on fixing the economy its almost not worth mentioning. The fed is in control of that and the pres, as long as he doesn't veto everything the fed does, generally is good for the economy. I'll further this in my last speech if I need to clarify but the time it takes a pres to do something is a huge hindrance for depending on him to save the economy. Its not like we're even in huge trouble as it is (yes we are in a technical recession but that's not the huge trouble I'm talking about). And our debt is a big problem but the pres isn't the one to fix this. Congress is the body that is in charge with bookkeeping. If anything though I think Obama's health care plan (Below) will substantially fix our debt from soc. security. 4. Healthcare Obama and Mccain's plans are almost the exact same. You did not read by points on Obama's plan. They both want to focus on prevention (Obama moreso) and Mccain wants to get everyone insured ( we can and must provide access to health care for all our citizens - this is from http://www.johnmccain.com...). If anything, Obama's plan is more conservative than McCain's as Mccain mandates everyone to be insured. Obama mandates all kids to be insured but he also wants all others to be insured by keeping costs down. Obama doesn't want to put up a million price restrictions. He openly states how he wants the insurance and medical companies to be at the table with him reforming the laws. We want and can find a solution that helps ALL parties. 15% of medical bills are due to us not having digital records but we don't have these records because it doesn't fiscally make sense for one organization to do it unless everyone does. By bringing everyone together we can save money and make everyone better off. That is Obama's plan. Mccain's is about the same except he wants to use the market and competition in determining prices. I see a market failure (digital records) which needs govt to correct the problem. Mccain thinks competition will solve the problem. Maybe one guy is right but both people but forth quality plans. Both are qualified to speak about the topic. Both are qualified (except maybe Mccain so far, see my other debate) to be president. That is my point here. I could argue how prevention is key to limiting future costs as it is cheaper to cure something small now than to cure it later and chronically but you get my point. 5. Taxes Obama states he will give a 1,000 tax cut to the middle class(http://www.barackobama.com...) but I don't see where either side has said much about taxes. Obama I know what to tax the upper middle-upper class (people making 200k + per year) more but your hardworking middle class families that can't afford to pay taxes argument doesn't work there. Obama and Mccain's sites read about the same for taxes w/ McCain's being more elaborate, but both sides are essentially in agreement. Cut taxes for the middle class. No new taxes unless its on the wealthy All I am saying is that Obama is qualified to be pres. He has well thought out positions and whether they are right or not isn't what matters. What matters is that they are "right enough" and well thought out. Obama has much experience in politics and similar positions to Mccain, a qualified candidate, except for Iraq. Here the reasoning they each have is the same but the outcome is different. Obama may not be the best candidate but he sure is qualified.