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"I&amp;#x27;ve always known the student body was full of energy here at Hofstra University on Long Island, but I have never seen such pride and enthusiasm from students like I have today. I said I was proud yesterday while I watched yesterday&amp;#x27;s debate prep around campus, but today took the star-spangled cake. Classes were cancelled today so students would be able to take in everything happening all over campus. There were speakers and an Issue Rally, where club organizations put on interactive displays related to the debate, a shoe toss inspired by Candy Crowley&amp;#x27;s statement: &amp;quot;My dream for this debate is that nobody at home throws a shoe at the TV and shouts, &amp;#x27;Why didn&amp;#x27;t she ask him that?&amp;#x27;&amp;quot; I won a Barnes &amp;amp; Noble gift card&amp;amp;#133;after five tries. No shame! I was also able to chat with three very passionate ladies about whom they&amp;#x27;re voting for, what they&amp;#x27;re looking forward to tonight, and what they would ask the candidates if given the chance. Taylor is a senior with a major in Film and minor in Political Science, who hopes to meld both of her passions, and create a political documentary one day. What are you most excited about today? The opportunity to catch a glimpse of the president. The fact that there&amp;amp;#8217;s media around and that it&amp;amp;#8217;s about something I care about is&amp;amp;#133;I just love being in the center of all this. What has been your favorite event today so far? WABC and Geraldo Rivera was here, and he saw my shirt and said, &amp;amp;#8216;You have to be on the radio to talk about it, so I pretty much talked about Harry Potter with Geraldo Rivera. Do you know who you&amp;amp;#8217;re voting for? Obama. Well, what I told Geraldo--my dear friend Geraldo--is that I&amp;amp;#8217;m a woman. That&amp;amp;#8217;s not the only reason, but I&amp;amp;#8217;m a woman, and Obama&amp;amp;#8217;s first to sign was the Ledbetter Act. He asked me, &amp;amp;#8216;You mean equal pay for women?&amp;amp;#8217; It&amp;amp;#8217;s not just about equal pay, it&amp;amp;#8217;s a symbol that Obama&amp;amp;#8217;s fighting for women. Obama said, &amp;amp;#8216;It&amp;amp;#8217;s important to make sure that women are treated fairly, and I&amp;amp;#8217;m going to fight for the [Ledbetter] act.&amp;amp;#8217; It&amp;amp;#8217;s symbolic not just for his support of equal rights, which isn&amp;amp;#8217;t the only issue for women, it&amp;amp;#8217;s also about equal pay for women, equal representation under the law. Victoria is a sophomore Political Science and English double major at Hofstra University. Is there an event going on today that you&amp;amp;#8217;ve really enjoyed? I&amp;amp;#8217;m looking forward to seeing Ed Rollins and Howard Dean speak later. Why are you voting for Governor Mitt Romney? He stands for the true conservative ideals that we have as a country. He supports the constitution and everything that we stand for as a Republican party. He [wants to] cut taxes and not raise taxes. He doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t want to level the playing field like Obama does. Is there a topic you want addressed by both candidates tonight? I&amp;amp;#8217;m really interested in seeing how they talk about what&amp;amp;#8217;s going on in the Middle East with Libya, seeing as how the administration had lied to us for two weeks about the fact that it was an attack in response to a video, which is completely not true. And of course, the issue of jobs because I&amp;amp;#8217;m a college student, and I don&amp;amp;#8217;t know if I&amp;amp;#8217;ll be able to get a job when I graduate from college. I want to make sure that I can pay my bills, so I want to see what each side says on what they&amp;amp;#8217;re going to do to create more jobs. It&amp;amp;#8217;s going to be really interesting. If you could ask the candidates one question, what would it be? I would ask, &amp;amp;#8216;What&amp;amp;#8217;s the best way you think we can create more jobs?&amp;amp;#8217; That&amp;amp;#8217;s something that affects everybody on this campus and across the United States. How are we going to get people [off of] food stamps and welfare? How are we going to get people to be more independent, rather than depending on the government to pay for their own food, and housing, and everything. I think that&amp;amp;#8217;s what I would ask: &amp;amp;#8216;How can we get people to get back on their own feet again?&amp;amp;#8217; Shannon is a senior with a major in Psychology and minor in Neuroscience. What has been your favorite event so far? The truth booth was really interesting, how they&amp;amp;#8217;re going to put together everyone&amp;amp;#8217;s truth statements and form something. Also, seeing everyone&amp;amp;#8217;s personal opinions and their signs, and what they&amp;amp;#8217;re protesting for. And the stands in the Student Center were really interesting. Do you know who you&amp;amp;#8217;re voting for? Yes. I am voting for Obama. I think Obama is moving forward. He wants to make changes. He doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t want to keep things the way they are. He&amp;amp;#8217;s been honest so far. I think he&amp;amp;#8217;s done a lot for our country. If there was a question you could ask both candidates, what would it be? I would ask them what they would do if they weren&amp;amp;#8217;t elected. Would they still be willing to help out our country and do as much as they could if they weren&amp;amp;#8217;t elected? Jenny is a senior with a major in Journalism and Global studies. Do you know who you&amp;amp;#8217;ll be voting for? Yes, I do. I will be voting for Governor Mitt Romney. I am a fairly staunch Republican, and I believe that fixing our economy and creating jobs is the most important thing the government can do for us right now. President Obama has proved that he is not capable of achieving this goal, and Governor Romney has the experience and qualifications that our country needs in a leader. What issue would you most like to see addressed tonight? I would really like the candidates to speak more on foreign affairs issues&amp;amp;#8212;specifically, Libya and Iran, and the Arab-Israeli conflict. I feel like these issues are much more important that they are given credit for, and would like to know more information on what each candidate&amp;#x27;s stance is and their plan of action. If you could ask both candidates one question, what would it be? &amp;quot;Why aren&amp;#x27;t either of you honest&amp;quot; Are you watching the debate right now? What do you think so far? Whose views of the Hofstra students most reflect yours? Let&amp;#x27;s talk! Oh, and don&amp;#x27;t miss this--I talked to 3 more students yesterday! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/inspired/blogs/the-conversation/2012/10/debate-2012-festivities-at-hof>