Presented by: Sister Mary Johnson, S.N.D., Professor of Sociology and Religious Studies

Engage with others in important pre-election analysis and viewpoints! Refreshments following.

Co-sponsored by College Democrats, Women’s Student Action Coalition, and Campus Ministry.

Meet Mitt Romney

Mitt was born in Detroit on March 12, 1947. His mother, Lenore, gave up an acting career when she met and married his father, George. Mitt’s father came from humble origins and never graduated from college. He apprenticed as a lath and plaster carpenter and sold aluminum paint before beginning a career that brought him to the head of American Motors and then the governorship of Michigan.

Mitt married his wife, Ann, in 1969. They first met in elementary school when he was a Cub Scout; he remembers tossing pebbles at her when she rode by on a horse. When they met again years later at a friend’s house, he was smitten. Between them, they have five sons and eighteen grandchildren, who are the center of their lives.

Like any family, the Romney’s have faced hardship: Ann was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1998, and more recently fought a battle with breast cancer. She credits her husband’s unwavering care and devotion to her for helping her through these ordeals.

Mitt is not a career politician. He has spent most of his life in the private sector, giving him intimate knowledge of how our economy works. But he has also been an outstanding public servant. In one chapter of his distinguished career, he reversed the decline of a state mired in recession. In another chapter, he salvaged the 2002 Winter Olympic Games from certain disaster.

Meet Paul Ryan

Paul was born the youngest of four children of Elizabeth A. Betty and Paul Murray Ryan. Ryan was first elected to the House in 1998, winning the 1st District seat of Mark Neumann, a two-term incumbent who had vacated his seat to make an ultimately unsuccessful bid for the U.S. Senate. Ryan won the Republican primary over 29-year-old pianist Michael J. Logan of Twin Lakes and the general election against his Democratic opponent, Lydia Spottswood. This made him the second-youngest member of the House.

Reelected six times, Ryan has never received less than 57 percent of the vote. He successfully defended his seat against Democratic challenger Jeffrey C. Thomas in the 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006 elections. In 2002, Ryan had also faced Libertarian candidate George Meyers. Ryan defeated Democratic nominee Marge Krupp in the 2008 election. Ryan defeated Democrat John Heckenlively and Libertarian Joseph Kexel in the 2010 general election in his district.

On August 11, 2012 the Romney campaign officially announced Ryan as its choice for Vice President through its “Mitt’s VP” mobile app as well as by the social networking service Twitter, about 90 minutes before Romney’s in-person introduction.  Before the official announcement in Norfolk, it was reported that Romney had decided to choose Ryan on August 1, 2012, the day after returning from his foreign trip through the United Kingdom, Poland and Israel. On August 11, 2012, Ryan formally accepted Romney’s invitation to join his campaign as his running mate, in front of the USS Wisconsin in Norfolk, Virginia.

Ryan is the major parties’ first-ever vice-presidential candidate from Wisconsin. Ryan married Janna Little, a tax attorney, in 2000. Little, a native of Oklahoma. The couple have three children: Liza, Charles, and Sam.

Meet Barack Obama

President Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4th, 1961, to a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas. Growing up, he was also raised by his grandfather, who served in Patton’s army, and his grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to become middle management at a local bank.

After working his way through college with the help of scholarships and student loans, President Obama moved to Chicago, where he worked as an organizer to help rebuild communities devastated by the closure of local steel plants.

He went on to Harvard Law School, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Upon graduation, he took a job teaching constitutional law at the University of Chicago. He also remained active in his community, leading a drive that registered more than 150,000 voters in Illinois leading up to the 1992 election.

Barack Obama was first elected to the Illinois State Senate in 1996. During his time in Springfield, he passed the first major ethics reform in 25 years, cut taxes for working families, and expanded health care for children and their parents. Elected to the U.S. Senate in 2004, he reached across the aisle to pass the farthest-reaching lobbyist reform in a generation, lock up the world’s most dangerous weapons, and bring transparency to government by tracking federal spending online.

As President, Barack Obama has dedicated himself to putting Americans back to work and restoring economic security to middle-class families. He’s been driven by the basic values that make our country great: America prospers when we’re all in it together, when hard work pays off and responsibility is rewarded, and when everyone—from Main Street to Wall Street—does their fair share and plays by the same rules.

MEET JOE BIDEN

Vice President Joe Biden was born in  Scraton, Pennsylvania on November 20, 1942, to Joesph Robinette Biden Sr. and Catherine Eugenia Finnegan.  He was the first of four siblings in a Catholic family. When Biden took office on January 3, 1973, at age 30, he became the sixth-youngest senator in U.S. history. In 1974, freshman Senator Biden was named one of the 200 Faces for the Future by Time magazine.

Biden was subsequently elected to six additional terms, in the elections of 1978, 1984, 1990,  1996, 2002, and 2008, usually getting about 60 percent of the vote. He did not face strong opposition; Governor Pierre S. du Pont, IV  chose not to run against him in 1984. Biden spent 28 years as a junior senator due to the two-year seniority of his Republican colleague William V. Roth, Jr. After Roth was defeated for re-election by Tom Carper in 2000, Biden became Delaware’s senior senator. He then became the longest-serving senator in Delaware history. In May 1999, Biden set the mark for youngest senator to cast 10,000 votes.

Biden became the 47th Vice President of the United States on January 20, 2009, when he was inaugurated alongside President Barack Obama. He succeeded Dick Cheney. Biden is the first United States Vice President from Delaware and the first Roman Catholic to attain that office.Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens administered the oath of office to Biden.

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.

-John Quincy Adams

How are you involved? Tell us in the comments below!

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Topic: Domestic policy
Air Time: 9:00-10:30 p.m. Eastern Time
Location: University of Denver in Denver, Colorado (Tickets)
Sponsor: Commission on Presidential Debates
Participants: President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney
Moderator: Jim Lehrer (Host of NewsHour on PBS)

The debate will focus on domestic policy and be divided into six time segments of approximately 15 minutes each on topics to be selected by the moderator and announced several weeks before the debate.

The moderator will open each segment with a question, after which each candidate will have two minutes to respond. The moderator will use the balance of the time in the segment for a discussion of the topic.

Thursday, October 11, 2012- Vice Presidential Debate

Topic: Foreign and domestic policy
Air Time: 9:00-10:30 p.m. Eastern Time
Location: Centre College in Danville, Kentucky (Tickets)
Sponsor: Commission on Presidential Debates
Participants: Vice President Joe Biden and Congressman Paul Ryan
Moderator: Martha Raddatz (ABC News Chief Foreign Correspondent)

The debate will cover both foreign and domestic topics and be divided into nine time segments of approximately 10 minutes each. The moderator will ask an opening question, after which each candidate will have two minutes to respond. The moderator will use the balance of the time in the segment for a discussion of the question.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Topic: Town meeting format including foreign and domestic policy
Air Time: 9:00-10:30 p.m. Eastern Time
Location: Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York (Tickets)
Sponsor: Commission on Presidential Debates
Participants: President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney
Moderator: Candy Crowley (CNN Chief Political Correspondent)

The second presidential debate will take the form of a town meeting, in which citizens will ask questions of the candidates on foreign and domestic issues. Candidates each will have two minutes to respond, and an additional minute for the moderator to facilitate a discussion. The town meeting participants will be undecided voters selected by the Gallup Organization.

Monday, October 22, 2012

Topic: Foreign policy
Air Time: 9:00-10:30 p.m. Eastern Time
Location: Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida (Tickets)
Sponsor: Commission on Presidential Debates
Participants: President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney
Moderator: Bob Schieffer (Host of Face the Nation on CBS)

The format for the debate will be identical to the first presidential debate and will focus on foreign policy.