In Which I Comprehensively Explain Why I Will Be Voting For Willard Mitt Romney

With all the talk about Romney lately after a great week he has had, this is as good a time as ever to bring out a diary that has been months in the making and explain to everyone why Romney is now officially my first choice in this wide-open field of candidates.

This may be a little long, but my intent with this diary is to be comprehensive and thorough in my reasoning as to leave little doubt why this man has won my support.

Read on ...

The Midas Touch – Mitt’s Non-political History

One of the first things I look at when I consider a Presidential candidate is their back story and previous experience, because you can learn a lot about someone from seeing where they came from, how they dealt with things, and what they’ve achieved before desiring to be President. This is where Mitt excels.

Family and Personal Life

First, he married his highschool sweetheart, Ann, in 1969 and has remained faithfully married to her to this day. They have a loving family with five sons and five daughters-in-law. Additionally, it appears that the whole of Romney’s personal life could be summed up in two words: integrity and dedication. He graduated summa cum laude and as valedictorian with his bachelor degree and then went on to work on and earn an MBA (top 5% of his class) and a law degree (cum laude) from Harvard - at the same time.

While this has little actual effect on Romney’s ability to govern well, it will be a breath of fresh air to have a candidate who is a true role model in the White House and for whom their personal life is a positive instead of a liability. With Romney, there will be no charges of impropriety in his marriage or his personal decisions; no claims of cocaine use, no DUI sprung at the last minute, no claims of lack of intelligence. There will be no cigar moments, no grand jury testimonies, and no travelgate investigations. Integrity and dedication seem to guide Romney in his personal choices, and Americans will respond well to that.

Business Life

If one’s desire is to see government run like a business, and it is mine, then you need look no farther than Romney for inspiration on this front. In addition to his marriage, his schooling, and the rest of his personal life being superb, his background in the private sector before becoming a politician is even better.

Romney co-founded an investment company known as Bain Capital in 1984 with an original fund of $37 million from private investors. Over the next 14 years, Romney would lead Bain Capital in many investments and acquisitions, including companies such as Staples, Domino’s, Toys ‘R Us, and Burger King. The company that began as a $37 million investment now manages over $27 billion in assets. Romney left Bain in 1998 to work on the Salt Lake City Games, but kept his interest in the company until 2001. Bain Capital is still operating and still continuing to do very well.

In 1990, six years into the success that was Bain Capital, an organization that Romney had worked for out of college requested that he come back and rescue them. Bain & Company was a management consulting firm out of Boston that Romney worked at for 6 years after college and was now on the verge of folding financially. They requested Romney be their CEO and turn things around, he obliged, and beautiful things happened. Via reforms and restructuring, he turned the entire company around in less than one year and made them profitable again without having to layoff any workers or losing any partners.

In 1998, Romney was called upon to save the Salt Lake City Games much in the same way he had saved Bain & Company. The games were facing a $379 million budget shortfall, plans to have to scale back the games, and allegations of bribery involving the then-President and Vice-President of the Committee. The President and VP were forced to resign, and Romney stepped in in 1999 as President and CEO. Again, he worked his magic and the budget shortfall became a $100 million profit – even including a $300 million security plan that had to be put in place after 9/11 – integrity was returned to the leadership, and the games were a great success. The games were actually expanded instead of scaled back, and the Salt Lake City Games stand as the most attended winter Olympics in history.

As you can see, Romney does seem to have the Midas Touch – everything he touches turns to gold. His business ventures that he manages and leads take off and are huge successes. He has experience with, and success in, managing budget shortfalls, turning companies and organizations around, making things profitable, and instituting necessary reforms and restructurings. I believe success in private executive roles translates directly into success in political executive roles. He is the epitome of success in his personal and private sector life.

The Commonwealth – Romney’s Political Life

Governor 2002-2006

After rescuing the Salt Lake City Games, Romney decided to run for Governor of his home state, Massachusetts. He has previously run in 1994 for Senator against Ted Kennedy and lost, and during that campaign made several statements that have come back to haunt him now, 12 years later. We will explore those statements later.

For now, though, Romney was coming off of three highly successful ventures in Bain Capital, Bain & Company, and the SLC Olypmics and desired to use his executive experience in leading his state as governor. In fact, Romney was pretty much drafted to run by the state Republicans after his successes and because they found the supposed front-runner, Jane Swift, to be unelectable in an election against a Democrat opponent. Romney obliged and won the primary and the election by running on a platform of reform – the same kinds of reforms he worked in the private sector. And reform he did.

His successes in the political executive office are as impressive as his successes in the private sector. Working with a Democratic-controlled state Congress, which cannot possibly be stressed enough, he turned a $3 billion deficit into a $700 million surplus - in just two years. Most impressively, he did this without raising taxes.

What makes that last point even more impressive is remembering he did it with a Democratic-controlled Congress that wanted to raise taxes. And not only was the Congress controlled by Democrats, they had well over a supermajority and could have overridden any veto Romney made. Instead, Romney met with them and convinced them not to raise taxes and to buy into his plan for reducing spending, reducing the size of government, and reforming necessary areas in order to get rid of the deficit. That is one of Romney’s strongest points and one of the biggest reasons I will support him: his ability to effectively vision cast. We’ll discuss that a little later as well.

So with the Democrats on board, Romney turned the Massachusetts financial situation around in less than two years. He did not raise taxes, but did raise the fees people had to pay for some programs such as driver’s license fees and marriage license fees. I couldn’t find any actual reports of the fee increase itself, but near as I can tell the driver’s license fee was upped $5 and the marriage license fee was upped $4. I don’t see this as a big deal at all, and I doubt many others do either, but Romney supporters must be honest about this point.

Abortion

Let’s get this off the table first thing: did Romney change his political position on abortion? Yes. It would do all Romney supporters well to remember that and not pretend otherwise. However, I happen to believe, as do many others, that his conversion was a sincere one. It should be left up to every individual to make that decision for him or herself. Was his conversion sincere or merely calculated for political gain? It’s up to you to decide, and the debate has been hashed out here time and time again. But in making that decision I would point to actions Romney has taken as Governor of Massachusetts, interviews where he has been very candid about his conversion experience, and the clear way he talks about the issue now.

But the main reason I fully support Romney in this area is rarely talked about – no matter what political position he has taken on abortion (pro-life or pro-choice), there is one area of the abortion debate on which he has been clear and consistent: states should determine for themselves their own abortion laws. This leads me to believe he will not only cast a clear and inspiring vision for the culture of life in general, but will also be committed to nominating Supreme Court Justices that will vote to overturn the atrocity that is Roe v Wade.

The War on Terror

The top three issues for me in a Presidential campaign are abortion, reducing the size of government (including, mostly, taxes), and the war on terror. I believe Romney is strong on all three of them, including the war.

But how can a Governor be suited to take over the Oval Office in the time of war, some have argued. He doesn’t have any foreign policy experience! We need a Senator or a… Mayor?

Romney’s credentials speak for themselves in this arena, and give even more reason to be comfortable with a Romney candidacy:

• He is on the Dept of Homeland Security’s Advisory Council

• He co-chaired the Homeland Security Committee of the National Governor’s Association

• He oversaw the complete security detail of the SLC Games, a point that cannot be stressed enough – a $300 million plan just three months after 9/11

• He made a gutsy call and denounced Khatami’s visit to Harvard, cut off all state funding for the trip, and denied him police escort while he was there

In addition to this, he has given several speeches that line out his views on the war on terror, including calling for the possibility of wiretapping mosques, racial profiling of foreign students, more money and attention on intelligence gathering, calling the War on Terror the war against radical jihadists and saying we need to understand the religious part of the war and our enemies, stating that only a small percentage of Muslims are extremists but that a small percentage of a large number is still a large number, and showing great support for Israel against Hezbollah and Hamas.

But so what, many detractors shout. So what if he talked about foreign policy? He hasn’t actually done any! Well, neither has Rudy. Or McCain. Or Huckabee. Or pretty much any of the other candidates at this point. What matters on foreign policy is your underlying beliefs, your intelligence about the subject, and the vision that you want to help America achieve in the world. And having run a multinational business for many years, and dealing with the hundreds of countries at the Olympic Games, couldn’t really hurt Romney in this area.

Vision Casting

This is the foundational reason I am excited about a Romney candidacy. Ever since Reagan, we have been clamoring for another “Great Communicator”. Not just so we won’t have to worry about our guy flubbing up a debate, but because great communicators inspire us with their vision of what America can be. They change people’s minds with their rhetoric and persuasive abilities. They are able to advance a conservative agenda by advancing a conservative philosophy. That is where Reagan excelled, and it is where, I believe anyway, Romney can excel as well.

Romney can reach across the aisle and get things done – not in a mushy pandering sort of way, but just like he did in Massachusetts: by describing his vision for things. He got a Democrat-controlled Congress on board with his decision to eliminate government jobs, reduce government spending and waste, and to not raise taxes. Friends and family that have heard him speak are impressed with him and willing to consider his views. He is a charismatic, likable, persuasive speaker. I am excited for what that could mean for the future of America and for the future of the Republican party.

The Other Alternatives

When I place Romney next to the other alternatives for a candidate in 2008, the choice becomes even clearer for me.

There’s John McCain, the man I could never bring myself to vote for – at least in a primary, and it would have to be pretty remarkable circumstances for me to vote for him in a general either. I believe this guy, while possibly providing a short-term victory to the GOP by keeping the White House in ’08 (and even that is a huge “if” at this point), would do great harm to our party and our image in the long run. As I said, my biggest three issues are abortion, taxes, and security, and I feel like I can only trust McCain on one of those. And even that might be subject to change should he feel the media need a new Sunday morning headliner.

Then there’s Rudy. I used to be able to pretend that I could ignore his stance on social issues. And according to the latest interview with Giuliani, that’s exactly the strategy he’s going for – focus on security and ignore social issues, and hope the electorate ignores them as well. That’s not good enough for me. It boggles my mind that the people who are wary of Romney because of flip-flopping charges are the same people who expect Giuliani, who fought to continue public funding of abortions and said no woman should ever be denied her right to an abortion, to govern the exact opposite way now. Abortion isn’t all about judges. It isn’t even a majority about judges. Rudy just hopes you forget about the whole subject. And his record on fiscal conservatism is being called into question now as well, as it appears he didn’t really balance the budget in NYC by cutting government – he did it a la Gray Davis by borrowing bonds and placing the city in $4.5 billion of debt when he left office.

How about Mike Huckabee? Huckabeeblatantly and proudly fails on the issue of reducing the size and scope of government. He has worked hard to expand the nanny state in Arkansas, especially in the education system (no soda machines in schools, kids forced to weigh-in to see if they’re losing or gaining weight) and the area of smoking bans (by passing the most comprehensive one in the country at the time and even suggesting a ban on smoking by pregnant women at any time). And he’s not that great on security, either, having spoken out against the NSA wiretap program and being incredibly lax on immigration (which is directly connected to security in my mind) – even saying opponents of guest worker programs might be racists. And Huckabeeisn’t exactly clean of scandals, either, during his term as Governor. In fact, many in Arkansas called him the Huckster because he was so slick.

The rest of the second tier candidates aren’t going to make a dent.

The Bottom Line

So when it comes down to it, for me, the choice is clear: Mitt Romney is officially my guy for 2008. He will be an inspiring and decisive leader, and I feel like we have in Romney a great hope to rekindle the conservative spirit across this country and see the promise of our great nation begin to be fulfilled.

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