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The reasons I back Mitt Romney, the Mormon over anyone by Cory Thompson To me Fred Thompson is the most consistent conservative that was in the top tier running. That being said it seems that the establishment has rejected Thompson and that’s their right. All is fair in love, war, and politics. With him not making any noise I guess I am forced to go with my second choice in Mitt Romney. I would like to take the time in this blog to explain why, exactly, a staunch conservative such as myself could step beside a controversial figure in the republican party and whom some conservatives feel is a fake. You would have to know me personally, but economy is a big issue for me. Third highest behind national security, and selecting judges. Frankly I think all of the republican candidates would be fine on national security. I don’t trust any of them after Thompson with the selecting of judges. I feel after Thompson that Romney would be the best on economy. So in my top three issues Romney clearly comes out on top nearly by default after Thompson. So in the first part of my Mitt Romney series I will talk about his record in taxes. I’ll start off with the bad. Romney did impose hundreds of millions in fee hikes while governor. Fees are more voluntary as they are charges on services rather than everyone picking up the government bill through higher taxes. I don’t agree with it or justify it, but it’s understandable considering the deficit he faced. However some of it did close loop-holes for big business and millionaires like Ted Kennedy and John Kerry. That is a major staple in the the democrats tax hikes “on the rich” which they don’t feel they need to tell you about. Guys like Kennedy and Kerry hide their money off shore with these loopholes. The tax burden once again falls squarely on the middle class. He also closed about 174 million worth of corporate loopholes. Most fees owed by corporations they have no problem passing onto the consumer. I can see where praise for Romney could come at closing some loopholes, but personally I would prefer tax cuts across the board. That being said Romney did propose to an unbelievably large liberal legislature to cut state income taxes from 5.3% to 5%. This was in 2004 and would have guaranteed 675 million on tax relief for over a year and a half(according to the club for growth). When the liberal legislature wouldn’t budge he then again proposed the same tax cut in 2005 and again in 2006 with no success. I have to give him credit for that considering what he was going up against in that state legislature. He was, however, successful after a big fight with the state government in passing a bill that prevented a capital gains tax from being applied retroactively. This resulted in a 275 million dollar rebate for capital gains taxes collected in 2002. There’s no question that his tax policy has inconsistencies in it while governor. However, it’s disputed that this may be because of the unbelievably liberal state legislature in Massachusetts. While he did not endorse the Bush tax cuts(nor did he oppose them) and dislikes the 17% flat tax, I can appreciate that he gives the Bush tax cuts credit for the economic growth we have seen in recent years and proposed broad-based tax cuts in a very liberal Massachusetts. That all being said looking to the future now with a Mitt Romney Presidency I’ve decided to look at some of his proposals. I don’t agree with Romney on his assessment of the FairTax, but I also believe the FairTax to be very improbable at the time. As far as actual tax code reform it seemed to me Thompson was the only candidate willing to go as far putting his plans out there, although Rudy has recently proposed a similar plan. I do agree, however, with Romney about taking taxes on capital gains for people making up to 200,000$ a year to 0%. He also wants to lower taxes on interests and dividends for middle income Americans as well. That, I also agree with. He also pledges not to raise taxes. That has to make all conservatives happy. It’s not ALL that I want by any means, but it’s a start in the right direction. As he goes farther right in his campaign I am encouraged. Next I will talk about his record on spending along with his proposals for the future. |
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part 2 This is the second installment as to why I back Mitt Romney. I talked about taxes in part 1 and while he doesn’t excite me as far as tax reform goes I do like his general overall stance on tax cuts. However, now I would like to talk about spending. People like to include the two issues together and that’s a mistake. Taxing and spending, while in the same category, are two different things. Mitt Romney has a considerably nice overall record on spending. The average spending increase in Romney’s four years increased annually by 2.22% which is very solid considering the liberal legislature. This was below the population plus inflation benchmark of 3%. He came into 2003 halfway into the fiscal year and forced large spending cuts. Again this was against the very liberal legislature. He faced a 650 million dollar deficit that was inherited from the previous administration and he was given unilateral power to make budget cuts. He made them to the tune of 343 million in cuts his first year alone. As this continued on through 2004 he continued to cut “nearly every part of state government.” Mitt Romney brought surpluses flowing into the state coffers. The way Mitt Romney tried to cut down on government spending by streamlining many duplicate and wasteful elements of the state government. Some of his plans included: plans to overhaul the wasteful Boston Municipal Court and close underused courthouses, merge the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority with the Highway Department, decentralize the management of the University of Massachusetts, streamline the Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission, and phase out the obsolete Worcester State Hospital where employees outnumber patients almost 3 to 1. On top of all of this he consolidated the social service and public health bureaucracy. He also restructured the Metropolitan District Commission. Romney then eliminated half of the states press positions saving over a million dollars of state revenue. To me this is also very impressive he made 425 million dollars worth of cuts in 2006 taking aim at local earmarks instead of allowing the state to dip into it’s 1.2 billion dollar rainy day fund. Sounds like exactly the opposite of what the federal government does now when it drys up social security funds. To me this is a very impressive fiscal record considering the absolute liberal legislature he had to work(more like fight) with on a day to day basis. He seems to understand the direction we need to go as far as spending is concerned. The next installment will be about his ideas on Free Trade and entitlement reform.
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3 I want to start off by saying No, Mitt Romney is not perfect by any means. Frankly I think Fred was VERY close to what I’ve wanted in a candidate for a long time and now with Fred gone I am forced to go with my number two candidate. That happens to be Mitt Romney if you couldn’t tell already. I actually feel he’s very, very intelligent. Very knowledgeable on most of the issues. As I’ve said before I think all of the republican candidates left viable would be fine on foreign policy so I turn to domestic and Mitt seems the best to me. I want to continue this series talking about his views on Free Trade and Entitlement reform. I’ll be honest. His record on Free Trade is scarce considering he was a governor. However his talking points are very supportive of the concept of Free Trade. A concept I happen to agree with very much. We need a President, in my opinion, that understands the relationship between a strong, growing economy and free trade. In a speech in 2005 Romney encouraged Corporations to trade aboard rather than fall towards protectionism. Romney was quoted as saying “We must move ahead in technology and patents. I don’t like losing any jobs but we’ll see new opportunities created selling products there. We’ll have a net increase in economic activity, just as we did with free trade. It’s tempting to want to protect our markets and stay closed. But at some point it all comes crashing down and you’re hopelessly left behind. Then you are Russia.” I know many do not like the CAFTA decision. They see some jobs leave because of it and it becomes a panic. However, to counter China’s growing demand it was necessary to open these trade agreements especially in our own backyard. He was quoted as saying “It does make me chuckle, when you see Congress struggling about whether we should open our trade with Central America. When Asia is looming off the horizon, we’re worried about El Salvador and Guatemala?” China is a much bigger threat and I believe Romney understands it and knows how to battle them economically. Entitlement reform is something that excites me when candidates talk boldly about it. It’s something that needs to happen and happen now. It’s an albatross on our country and of course liberals wish to expand these ridiculous programs. BRILLIANT! Anyways, now on to Mitt Romney’s record. Romney helped push state legislation to not only by increasing the number of hours required to work in order to receive welfare, but also placed a 5 year limit on receiving benefits. I LOVE this kind of thinking. Romney also to the dismay of liberals successfully pushed for medicaid recipients to pay for some of the services. He also successfully pushed for workers to pay 25% of their health-care costs which was up from 15%. As far as social security goes he has not embraced any known plan yet. Personally, I think the Galveston plan is wonderful. How do I know this? The government rejects and will not permit it, anymore after 1983. However, Romney refuses to raise social security taxes. He also supports personal accounts and reducing the growth rate of future benefits. Truly I feel if anyone can look at this problem and fix it in a practical manner that Mitt can based on his knowledge of these types of issues. However, I would like to see more talk about this very important subject. Now we get into an issue which Romney and I differ a little bit on, but I understand in part about why he had to go the route he had to go. This, of course, is his health care ideas. He has received much scorn for this from republicans and probably rightly so. However, we have to consider the fact that he was working with a massively northeastern liberal legislature(which he has been pretty decently successful with in pushing right wing values) and the fact that he was also facing a Bush threat to cut off $385 million per year in federal Medicaid funds unless the state reduced the number of uninsured people. He does deserve credit for attempting under these conditions to move a bad system more towards the free market. Many of the health-care problems are because of federal law in which Romney’s hands are obviously tied. He proposed a plan that encourages individual-owned health insurance and that would bypass some of the unfairness in the federal tax code(the tax code impedes individual ownership of health insurance). Frankly it’s not a plan I feel he should brag about, but maybe brag about any of the actual gains he made under those conditions. In contrast to subsidizing hospitals he chose to subsidize individuals in the way of an assistance program. I really dislike programs in general, but this in a way seems to move toward encouraging private ownership of health insurance instead of just giving the hospitals money. Romney’s original proposal offered the individual the option of forgoing insurance and posting a bond in an interest-bearing account. This is more the direction we want to go, but the liberal legislation shot it down. This alone tells me he’s not in any kind of favor of universal health-care and I was harsh on him at first hearing about this plan not taking into account what kind of legislation and pressure from the Bush administration he was dealing with so I have to credit him at least that much. The health plan that did come to pass certainly is not the total direction we want to move toward that’s for certain. However, judged by earlier proposals that were shot down I have to believe he truly is for free market health-care and individual ownership of health insurance. That being said he needs to stop bragging about that plan in Massachusetts in my opinion. However, thanks to research it’s not nearly as much of an issue for me anymore in supporting Mitt Romney. Some of Romney’s ideas for reform(especially on welfare) are fairly exciting. I like that he has that mindset. However, I wish he would get on the ball with tax reform and more-so social security reform. That being said he does lean in the right position on most of these issues and that is encouraging for me in a candidate. The next installment will be about regulation. Another touchy issue with me.
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4 I am writing this installment of my “Backing Mitt Romney” series in regards to regulation. Regulation is a big pet peeve of mine as it should be any conservative. Regulation really halts economic growth. We have somewhere from 60 to 80,000 pages of regulations on the free market today. As I’ve always said the free market really is just a shell of what it was 80 years ago. I’m looking for a candidate that will be AGAINST regulations as they come through the federal government. Not one that sees it and says “hmm that’s a good idea” like some “other” candidates have proposed. It’s long overdue to finally start repealing many of these regulations. Mitt Romney’s record on regulation in Massachusetts is good. It’s not as successful being that it’s Massachusetts legislature, but his proposals were pretty good. Anyone else notice a trend here? See when I first heard of Mitt Romney a year ago I immediately dropped him from consideration because he was the governor of a state where I can’t stand it’s legislature. However it’s become more and more apparent that he was really at odds quite often with the likes of the Ted Kennedy’s and John Kerry’s. For that I have to praise him. He did fight for republican and conservative issues. That’s worth commending. Now onto his record. First of all he supports drilling in ANWR. Thank you!! Anyone listening? To get energy independent we are going to have to drill in our own land. That’s just factual. His efforts on the state level were to better improve the conditions for a constitutional relationship between government and free enterprise. As conservatives we have to support these kinds of individuals. He vetoed an increase in minimum wage from 6.25 to 8 dollars. He compromised on a .25 cent raise while saying that a raise in minimum wage causes the loss of jobs. Minimum wage is another form of artificial pricing. Wages are a cost to do business. On other measures he vetoed a bill limiting the ability of out-of-state wineries to ship directly to Massachusetts consumers, calling the legislation “anti-consumer” and I have to agree. That also interferes with those business’, but more-so with the consumer. He supported and signed a bill that offered a less turbulent path through the state’s burdened permitting process for new business. Translation: less red tape. He proposed the easing of price regulations on retailers. This is that artificial pricing I was talking about. Very impressive for him to stand up this because this is not usually politically viable or the politically correct thing to do. However, it’s the RIGHT thing to do not only to help business, but to help the consumer as well. He also called for the privatization of Massachusetts Medical School. He proposed measures to eliminate civil service protection for all municipal workers except police and firefighters and exempt low-cost public construction jobs from the state’s wage law. This is something I really like about Mitt Romney. He understands prices and the damage that price control does and showed it in regards to exempting construction from the state’s wage law. Mitt Romney pushed to deregulate Massachusetts’ auto insurance industry. Massachusetts is the only state in which the government mandates maximum insurance rates and requires insurers to accept every applicant. Can anyone say communism? Mitt was right to fight this and I applaud him for his stance. Good Job, Mitt! That isn’t to say that Mitt has no flaws. I wish to be objective and I realize that no candidate is 100% what I want in a conservative or republican. While Romney did not impose this position, he does support indexing the minimum wage to inflation. Eeeek, Mitt. Have to disagree there. He also signed into law banning smoking in the workplace INCLUDING bars and restaurants. Can anyone say…Huckabee? However, at least this was state law and I don’t believe he would push this federally. Either way it’s an infringement on the rights of the business owners to make these decisions. Overall taking the bad with the good I think Mitt Romney’s record on regulation is impressive. He does push for many conservative principles in regards to the relation between government and the free market. I feel he understands business very well as well as understands basic economics(I feel stupid even saying that considering how much more he’s achieved than I might ever accomplish in a lifetime). Mitt Romney is an excellent choice for economic reasons, but also understanding in large where the line is drawn between business and government regulation. This just strengthens my view of how he would govern as President. It’s becoming more and more clear to me that he very much favors the businessman and individual in the private sector over government control. The next installment will be about School Choice and Tort Reform all in one.
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5 Ah, where to go next in discussing Mitt Romney’s record and stances? Oh yeah! Tort reform and school choice. Two issues that are important, but usually go by the way side in elective politics. Two issues that are difficult for a politician to take on and to be honest usually that’s our fault. This is a message that does not get communicated enough. We need to apply conservative principles to these two issues and I’m going to talk about Mitt Romney’s stance in these areas. Governor Romney is on record supporting charter schools, school vouchers, and home schooling. He really did focus more towards charter schools during his tenure as Governor. He pushed to eliminate a state cap on the number of charter schools(why would there be a cap on this sort of thing in the first place? Oh yeah it’s Massachusetts) and successfully vetoed a delay on the opening of new charter schools in the state. Good he’s leaning towards more private education, but this is just a very small step in the direction we need to go. Acknowledging that fact it was probably more wise of him to spend political capital on more attainable goals. However, we need to go much further than these schools that are still publicly funded. Where I disagree with Romney is as a Governor he has warmed up more to the department of education. Before he became Governor he believed it needed to be abolished. Alas, such is the total republican party flip it seems once they reach the legislative or executive levels of the government. Romney has always been a strong proponent of tort reform. He supported capping personal injury claims in automobile related cases and advocated for overhauling the state’s ridiculous malpractice system. Massachusetts is known for having some of the highest malpractice insurance rates in the country. Translation: Doctors are leaving the state. I promise you that’s not a good thing although I don’t see liberals complaining about THEIR insurance rates. Figures. I can imagine this was a thorn in the side of the liberals in that state. In 2006 Governor Romney proposed specific tort reforms such as reducing lawyer fees from 25% for verdicts over $500,000 to 15% for verdicts over $600,000. Ah, this takes incentive down to go to court over everything. Usually people go to court based on bad information given to them by attorneys. He also proposed to tighten the states tribunal system so that only the most deserving malpractice cases go to trial. I will freely admit that is a bit too open for interpretation for me personally, but the idea is right. One proposal of his I do like very much is to reduce lawsuits by allowing doctors to disclose medical errors without fear of admissibility in court. Folks, it’s time we started getting in the corners of our doctors in this country. They are people and they make mistakes just like everyone else. We need to give them more freedom in helping their patients without fear of malpractice lawsuits(you listening John Edwards?). We need to come back to the table and be reasonable. Doctors by vast majority are compassionate people that want to help their fellow man. I believe some of Governor Romney’s tort reform proposals would go a long way in achieving a better doctor-patient relationship.
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He is pro isreal
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realize something...we cant be one trick ponies. We need a good economist, Mitt is superior to anyone. He is strong on the war. He is strong on immigration. I think he can be a great President.
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