So Bush's hometown paper endorses Kerry?

Is it because they're for Kerry? Or is it because they're against someone, or something else?

This Opinion Journal article cites the racism and anti-Baptist leanings of the paper's founder, but without seeing how it's reflected in today's articles and editorials, it's as relevant as noting that the Washington Times was founded by members of the Unification Church.

Better to go to the paper's website and judge the content for yourself.

On a quick read-through, the reasons stated for endorsing Kerry amount to "Bush isn't conservative enough".

The paper cites a number of reasons for reversing its year 2000 endorsement of Bush, including:

• Spending $507 billion from the Social Security trust fund on other projects,
• Cutting Medicare and Veterans' benefits,
• Eliminating overtime pay for Americans,
• Raising oil prices 50%,
• Tax cuts,
• Encouraging businesses to send jobs overseas,
• The Iraq war,
• Turning the surplus into a deficit,
• His plans to privatize Social Security,
• His behavior after the World Trade Center attacks,
• Ignoring the official warning of the WTC attacks a full month before they occurred,
• Spending too much time on vacation.

They favor Kerry because:

• He's remained true to his vote authorizing the use of force in Iraq. (This authority was limited to threatening force to intimidate Hussein into allowing weapons inspections.)
• He voted against the $87 billion for the war because the bill promoted poor policy in Iraq, gave money to Halliburton, and increased the debt load on future generations.
• He has a four-point plan that is realistic, wise, strong, and correct.
• He'll involve our allies in Europe and the Middle East
• He'll train Iraqi security forces
• He'll involve Iraqis in their own rebuilding and constitution-writing
• He'll forgive Iraq's debts
• He'll convene a regional conference with Iraq's neighbors and secure a pledge of respect for Iraq's borders and non-interference in Iraq's internal affairs.
• He'll provide, economically, for Americans first.

This is presented without any commentary on the merits of these points. (There's a Social Security trust fund???) (Where did the authorization say it was only intended to be used to intimidate? Why did Kerry believe that's all he was authorizing with his vote?)

Feel free to check out these points for yourself.