On January 18, I had the opportunity to go to Oklahoma City and spend the day with some old military friends of mine. While I was there, they invited me to go down to the local teamsters union with them to hear John Edwards, one of the Democratic presidential hopefuls, speak to teamsters and their families. While I'm not a huge fan of John Edwards, I am open to hearing new thoughts and ideas. And since I wasn't doing anything else at the time, I figured I'd go with them, and hear what Mr. Edwards had to say.

We got to the Teamsters Local 886 Headquarters Building about 30 minutes before the rally was scheduled to begin. The speech wasn't supposed to start until 6:15 p.m., but the place was pretty full when we got there. We found our seats, and waited for the event to start. There was quite a large turn-out, which was surprising with the bitter cold temperatures in Oklahoma City that evening.

Mr. Edwards didn't talk for very long, but the people in attendance appeared to really appreciated what he had to say. There were lots of cheers and shouts of agreement from the crowd. He did raise some good points. He had quite a few negative things to say about Hillary Clinton and her questionable campaign contributions. That actually made me laugh a little - I like anyone that has the guts to call Hillary out on her inappropriate behavior. Mr. Edwards also talked about his plans to help families secure health insurance and better jobs. If he gets elected, I hope he can follow through with his promises, both of those are much needed, especially with today's economy.

However, Mr. Edwards did make a few comments about former President Reagan that didn't really agree with me. I wasn't a huge fan of Mr. Reagan, since I was very young when he was in office, but I saw no reason to speak negatively of him, since he is not one of the contenders in this race, and has been dead now for almost four years. I realize that he was speaking about Barack Obama's comments about Mr. Reagan and how he helped the American economy, but I didn't feel that Mr. Edwards needed to bring those comments up last night.

I do think that Mr. Edwards secured a few votes for his efforts in Oklahoma City. I haven't decided which candidate I'm going to vote for yet, but after last night's rally, I'm interested in reading and hearing more about Mr. Edwards and the rest of the candidates. This will be a very interesting presidential election, and I'm excited and a bit apprehensive to see what happens. Whoever is elected will not only be the President of the United States, but my Commander-in-Chief as well, and I hope that Americans make the right choice. I was not old enough to vote in the election that elected the first President Clinton, and I'm not sure that the White House needs another Clinton in residence. Electing a President during peacetime is a whole lot different than wartime elections, so there are a lot more issues to consider before we head to the polls later this year.

Shortly after his trip to Oklahoma City, Mr. Edwards did withdraw his bid for the Presidential nomination. While this election may not have been the right time for Mr. Edwards to run, maybe the 2012 election season will have better results for him, should he choose to run again.

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