As investors, we vote for stocks every day. We put our hard-earned money behind companies that we think are moving in the right direction, that are growing their businesses and that will reward us with a healthy return.

After Americans head to the polls to vote, I can’t help but think about the link between politics and stocks. Government bailouts, increased regulation and Fed intervention have politicized many companies, so, on the other side of Election Day, we’ll take a look at some of the stocks that have helped draw political lines in the sand to see if they are worth owning right now.

Drilling Stocks

The massive oil spill this summer brought huge political attention to the Gulf Coast, BP PLC (NYSE: BP), Halliburton Co. (NYSE: HAL) and offshore drilling. Outrage over the lack of a contingency plan for catastrophic failures, the impact on wildlife and the strain on businesses put Washington into action, and a six-month moratorium on offshore drilling was put in place.

With the announcement that Halliburton may have used materials they knew were inferior and could have caused the failure that led to the spill, more regulation and increased scrutiny on offshore drilling will be on the way. In light of this, are BP and HAL good buys right now? Are there any good buys in this sector?

Well, the answer to the first question is a definite NO. BP and HAL are both sell-rated companies in my Portfolio Grader stock rating tool and have been for nearly all of 2010. The fundamentals aren’t there, and there isn’t enough support behind the stocks to make them good buys right now.

But, when I look at other companies involved in offshore drilling, there are some stocks that make the grade.

Boardwalk Pipeline Partners L.P. (NYSE: BWP) Permian Basin Royalty Trust (NYSE: PBT) Buckeye GP Holdings L.P. (NYSE: BGH) and Enterprise Products Partners L.P. (NYSE: EPD) are all in the same industry as BP, and all are impacted by offshore drilling.

Each of these companies receives an overall “A” in Portfolio Grader, due in large part to buying pressure. Fundamentals and the outlook for offshore drilling is still questionable, so be careful with these types of companies in the near term.

Banking Stocks

These days investing doesn’t get any closer to politics than when it comes to banks. After all, it was government bailout money that made taxpayers owners in high-profile banks in the first place.

It’s no secret that I still want you to avoid most banking stocks. It was just two weeks ago that I discussed two banks, Citigroup (NYSE: C) and JPMorgan (NYSE: JPM), and decided that buying now was not the best idea for smart investors. I still think that you should avoid the whole sector here in the U.S., but there are some international banks that are making the grade right now. Banco de Chile (NYSE: BCH) and BanColombia S.A. ADS (NYSE: CIB) are both Latin American commercial banks that are experiencing strong growth from their emerging economies.

If you want to see growth in financials, you have to look outside the U.S.