I only vote for candidates that I can say I support. I don’t waste
it to vote against someone; settling for the lesser of two evils means you
still have evil. I’m not a fan of Mitt
Romney; never have liked him, probably never will. But I also consider Barack Obama to be one of
the worst presidents in American history; so I won’t be voting for Obama. For the first time since the mid-1980s I
haven’t felt I could truly support any of the candidates.
So, for the last many weeks I’ve been weighing what truly matters
to me and where the two major party candidates align to my beliefs. Based on that I discovered that even though I
wouldn’t vote for Obama, there were many reasons I couldn’t vote ‘for’ Romney
either:
Core Beliefs – Romney’s
views and positions seem to change based upon whose votes he is attempt to gain
at that point in time. He comes off as
someone who will tell you what he thinks you want to hear. By contrast, President Obama seems to have very
strong core beliefs, yet chooses to keep them mostly secret from us and only
tells us the little snippets that he wants us to know. I’m more concerned by what he has NOT shared
than what he has. BOTH FAIL
Purpose in Running –
Romney’s main objective has been to be President. It is one thing to run because you have a
vision for leadership and that takes you to the Presidency, it is another thing
to simply seek the position. By contrast, since
President Obama’s meteoric rise to power, his approach has been ‘Barack’s way
or no way’ as if he is the US Emperor rather than US President; which leaves me
to believe he too simply sought the power of the position. BOTH FAIL
Jobs – Romney
promises to create new jobs. I certainly don’t
have a problem with creating new jobs; but I do have a problem with ANYONE in the
government being looked to as the source of those jobs. We are all better off if the government stays
out of our way and allows US private enterprise to do what it has always done
best. Romney claims to be a free
enterprise kind of leader, yet he panders for votes by promising something that
should be in sharp contrast to what he claims are his views.
By
contrast, President Obama has no problem with government being the source of
new jobs – so much so that he has expanded the size of government at an
alarming rate literally creating a whole bunch of new taxpayer funded jobs. He also likes to brag about creating over 5
million new private sector jobs – but that’s a lie; the fact checkers say it’s
less than 350,000. BOTH FAIL
Moral Ground – I’ll start by saying I find the ‘separation of church and state’
concept to be a bogus one. It was born
from a single sentence, taken out of context, in one letter written by Thomas
Jefferson to a minister – not included in ANY official documents. And yet our society has grasped with gusto at
this little straw in its vain attempt to keep God at arm’s length. That having been said, it’s still good to see
a politician be willing to take a stand on moral issues; even if such a stand
costs votes. While this may not be
politically wise, it reveals a great deal about the candidate’s character – and
that is what I want to see. On far too many occasions
Romney has either waffled on moral issues or has dodged them entirely. (I mean really, why couldn’t he even laud the
tremendous grassroots support of Chick-Fil-A?)
By
contrast, President Obama claims to be a Christian but then oversees an Administration
that seems bent on knocking the legs out from under Christianity in our nation. Whether it’s forcing Christian business
owners / organizations to pay for contraceptives for employees or using the IRS
to restrict First Amendment rights to Free Speech, the Obama Administration has
shown itself to be no friend of God. BOTH FAIL
Immigration –
Another topic where Romney walks a thin, very moderate line. Actually he tends to avoid it as much as
possible, except to accuse of President Obama of failing, and falls just short
of pandering for the votes of those who support granting rights to those in our
country illegally. By contrast,
President Obama has very clearly made it known that he has no regard for state
sovereignty as he not only overrides state immigration laws, but attempts legal
action against those states who have the audacity to try to look out for their
needs when his Administration has failed to do so. BOTH FAIL
If I stopped there I would be deadlocked – forced to either go 3rd
Party or not vote for a presidential candidate at all this time around. But even though I have to cross out both of
the candidates in these areas that truly matter to me; there are still a few
areas where I may be able to find hope:
Foreign Policy –
Romney has very little actual foreign policy experience (unless you include
offending the British at the outset of the Olympics). But he does articulate the concepts of
running an international business – and many of those same concepts would serve
him well in managing our foreign policy.
By
contrast, President Obama’s foreign policy seems to be for the United States to
subjugate its status to whatever the whims of the international community
area. He shows greater interest in
currying favor with the United Nations than actually being leader of the free
world; and his failure to lead or even hold ANYONE responsible for Benghazi
should be grounds for impeachment whether he’s re-elected or not. ROMNEY WINS
Tax Policy –
Romney understands that the only way to truly alleviate the tax burden on the
middle class is not through further raising taxes on any groups, but rather
increasing the number of revenue generating businesses who can hire more
workers thus creating more tax payers and consumers which in turn fuel the
growth of more revenue generating businesses.
By
contrast, President Obama would have us believe we can tax ourselves into
prosperity. He would have us believe
that ‘trickle down economics’ have never worked – which is yet another of his
lies. He would have us believe that Bill
Clinton’s tax policies resulted in a balanced budget – conveniently overlooking
the Republican controlled Congress that wouldn’t allow Bill to spend excessive
amounts like Barack has already done. He
would also have us believe that a family with a combined income of $250,000 is
the same thing as a millionaire. Our
economy has started to rebound not because of Obama’s economic policies, but in
spite of them. ROMNEY WINS
Bi-Partisan Efforts –
Everyone is sick of the bitter, deep partisan divide in our nation today. While I am personally turned off by Romney’s
wishy-washy RINO status, I’m also reminded of the old saying: “only Nixon could
go to China”. Maybe the Des Moines
Register got it right when they cited Romney’s past of being able to work with
Democrats in Massachusetts as proof he might finally be the guy to successfully
reach across the aisle in DC. By contrast,
despite his grand statements about inclusion when he was first elected,
President Obama made it clear you were either with him or against him from day
one. He was the one who drew the line in
the side and he was the one who forced Republicans to either blindly support
him (as Democrats did) or fulfill their duty as the minority party to challenge
and question policies. When they
actually did their job, he isolated them and even used some of the slickest
insider moves ever seen to shove through Obamacare so fast not even its
supporters really understood what they were inflicting upon an unsuspecting
nation. President Obama is incapable of
bipartisanship unless it is everyone agreeing with him. ROMNEY WINS
So, in the end I have two candidates that I don’t care for, neither
of who gives me anything I like on the issues that matter most to me. But I can find a handful of additional topics
which I am able to find a reason to honestly say I can support one candidate
over the other. So on
the eve of the election, I am finally able to list all the reasons I won’t be
voting for Mitt Romney… and thankfully a few reasons that I will.
