From The Nation: Questions for the Candidates

• The business-financial establishment and leading corporate-financed think tanks are leading a major lobbying campaign to cut people's benefits from Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Will you promise to oppose these efforts?

• The United States is hemorrhaging debt from its trade deficits - $700 billion a year - what is your plan to stop the bleeding?

• We're losing jobs at an increasing rate. States and cities are gearing up for deep cuts in construction, schools, and health care. The Federal Reserve has committed over $500 billion to backstop banks and investment houses, and the Treasury has just guaranteed 5 trillion in loans to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. What is your plan to help kick start the real economy?

• Do you agree with Defense Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen, Chair of the Joint Chiefs, who insist that the Pentagon budget must grow?

• Why would you promote NATO expansion as a security building policy considering that had Georgia been a member of NATO when it launched its attack on Southern Ossetia, under the Treaty's Article Five guarantee the US would now be at war with Russia?

• The US has the highest childhood poverty rate of any industrialized nation with 20 percent of children under age 6 living in poor families, costing about $500 billion dollars per year to the US economy, or 4 percent of GDP. What is your plan to reduce childhood poverty during your administration?

• According to the New York Times, in 1995 Senator McCain promoted a moratorium on federal regulations of all kinds, saying that excessive regulations were "destroying the American family, the American dream." Does the Senator still feel that way? And what kind of regulatory architecture is needed to prevent the fraudulent gimmicks that led to our current financial crisis?