“These last two years have not been the best of times. But while we’ve lost a couple of years, we have not lost our way. The principles that made us a great nation and leader of the world have not lost their meaning. They never will. We know we can bring this country back. I’m Mitt Romney. I believe in America, and I’m running for President of the United States.”
With those words, spoken from a farm in New Hampshire, Mitt Romney officially launched his second run for the White House. He lost his bid for the Republican nomination in 2008, but now is back to redeem himself. He asked those gathered there in New Hampshire to “Believe in America”, and summon that common spirit in all Americans that can overcome any odds and change our outlook of the future.
People across the nation believe in that message. Citizens from every corner of the country think that come November, Mitt Romney should be the one receiving the reins of government and lead our country as the next President of the United States. In the coming weeks and months the former Governor will make a very strong case to voters everywhere and continue to convey a message of renewal and prosperity for America.
However, I’m not buying his ideas and plans and I want to make the case for why you shouldn’t either. I want to express my views and opinions of Mitt Romney and tell you why he should not be our next president. I also want to share some ideas about how Romney can become more electable, likeable, and win this hard fought election.
Here in America we celebrate success and try to open as many doors of opportunity as possible to anyone willing to walk through them. No matter what party you belong to, you have to applaud Governor Romney’s success in the private sector, as well as in the 2002 Winter Olympics. We are fortunate to have stories of achievement like his. Governor Romney is a strong family man with firm beliefs in his faith. While I disagree with him on political policies, there’s no doubt Governor Romney is a man of high character and integrity who has committed much of his life to religious and public service. Attacking his personal life and family is a cowardly avenue in which to gain political advantage, and it has no place in this election or any other.
In 1984, Governor Romney and his partners found the private equity investment firm Bain Capital. Bain Capital’s first business undertaking was investing in startup companies, eventually helping companies like Staples grow to success. Later, Romney and his partners turned their attention to the business of leveraged buyouts, which comprised of buying firms with money from banking institutions, using the firm’s assets as collateral and subsequently selling off those assets after a few years. Throughout his career and business ventures, Governor Romney grew a personal net worth of over $200 million.
Any businessman who can grow that much wealth should be praised and modeled after. Yet, in Governor Romney’s case, he learned the wrong lessons and, like any other business, Bain Capital had its bad side.
In a few cases, companies acquired by Bain Capital had massive layoffs, were smothered with debt, and many went into bankruptcy while Romney and his partners walked away with millions. Perhaps in some deals, Romney didn’t care about the average worker or even the continuity of the company. He was a vulture hunting for personal gain. I believe Romney was always trying to do good for every party for each deal, but it was the wrong principles and values that led him to be known as an “outsourcing pioneer,” someone who wanted large returns and minimal risk. It’s this type of business record that will not transpire into good ideas to lead this country, to help our ailing economy, and to help move this country forward.
On January 2, 2003, Mitt Romney was sworn in as governor of Massachusetts. The new Governor walked into a deep recession when assuming office, facing a projected $3 million deficit and a slow economy trying to recover from the nationwide recession in the early 2000s. He entered with a state legislature composed of nearly 85% Democrats and strong opposition. Yet, he chose his cabinet not along party lines, but rather chose individuals who would fight with him to face the problems the state had at hand. Through different methods of increased revenue and closing tax loopholes, Massachusetts was able to run a surplus for the first two years Romney was in office, in addition to putting in place stricter gun control laws and raising both education standards as well as the minimum wage. He surely did have notable and numerous achievements that any citizen should be proud of, but yet, again, out of the good came the bad.
As Governor, Romney failed to help create the jobs and induce a sense of prosperity for a state that was falling behind in job creation. His dreadful record as job creator in a single state will not convert into a job creator on a national level. During his term, Massachusetts stood at an awful 47th out of 50 in total job growth, only improving the unemployment rate by a dismal one percent. It’s this type of economic record that Governor Romney cannot run on and it is the ideas he used in Massachusetts that will not help the nation right now.
Starting in 2004, Romney focused his attention and efforts into providing near universal healthcare to all citizens of Massachusetts. Crossing party lines and working with people on both sides, he was able to pass the first such law in any state. The new law was groundbreaking and unprecedented, providing healthcare to those couldn’t afford it, those who had been previously denied, and those who had never before had access to good coverage. Today, nearly all people in Massachusetts have health insurance, a good accomplishment for Mitt Romney.
The problem arises when the Governor now criticizes the President about a law he helped inspire. Healthcare is something everyone has a right to. It shouldn’t be a privilege only for the select few, and such a law should be implemented on a national level. Romney shouldn’t be attacking the President for something he believes should be only on a state level, because it shouldn’t be. Nearly every speech, he’ll tell you about how he will repeal “Obamacare” or how the healthcare law is a job killer and a government takeover. It is not. This is a dangerous avenue Romney is trekking through and a battle he will continue to lose.
The facts are the facts. Governor Romney’s plan would repeat many of the policies of the past, deregulate Wall Street, eliminate health care coverage for numerous people, and instead of moving America forward, causing it to take a big leap backward.
Under his plan, the richest people at the top would receive big tax breaks while the middle class is once again eluded of the help they need. He doesn’t admit it, but what he will do is buy into the idea of “trickle down” economics. He will push for an economy that is built on the principle that if people at the top do really well, somehow the riches will trickle down. His campaign and speeches have been blunt and unclear on specifics for how to deal with our economy, something that will come back to hurt him. He will bring back many of the regulations to the banks on Wall Street, the same banks that cratered the economy back in 2008.
Rally after rally, he has announced that on his first day in office he will repeal the new healthcare law. What he doesn’t understand is that repealing a law that now has given millions of people access to healthcare is risky business. Repealing the Affordable Care Act would deny millions of children and women the care they need and the doors to which they could now receive insurance would be shut. The opportunity for healthcare reform won’t come for another generation and people cannot and should not have to wait. His plans for healthcare have been as unspecific as that for his economic plan.
Governor Romney has been quoted as saying ending the war in Iraq was “tragic.” Ending this war is an incredible accomplishment by this president, and one that everyone should be proud of. We were bogged down too long, nation building in a country that we, perhaps, no business invading in the first place. Sending our troops home was a top priority of this president and he got it done. Governor Romney wants America to continue to act as overbearing police force in the world, and while we do hold a responsibility to protect other nations, our mission was accomplished in Iraq. In his convention speech, Romney had no mention of our troops, or our current mission in Afghanistan, a war the president has already laid out a plan to end as well. Romney has no foreign policy experience, and this experience cannot be gained on the job. He is possibly walking into an administration that would blindly tackle the job of America’s interest beyond our shores.
Voters from every corner of this country are having such a tough job relating and warming up to Governor Romney. His enormous wealth and fortune had built such an insurmountable wall between him and voters. He is simply too out-of-touch with the average American. People aren’t like him; they don’t have numerous homes, horses, and cars like he does. He does not really relate to the average person struggling to pay the mortgage or send their kids to college because he never had these struggles. He just does not get it and I surely cannot warm up to him, the same problem numerous other people are struggling with.
So has does Mitt Romney rebound? Surely the journey from here to the election will be tough, an uphill battle that the former Governor will struggle to deal with. What he has to do is be more transparent, more open and not as distant and unappealing. He should not keep attacking the President on the amount of taxes he paid, but rather talk about how he can end the loopholes that allowed him to pay such low taxes. He needs to give more specifics and stop focusing on what the President has not done, and instead focus on what he will do, and not just use rhetoric, but use actual facts to back up his claims.
In my mind, it really doesn’t matter what he does. He will not be elected our next President. If you look past his speech highlights and thirty-second ads, you’ll begin to see the real man and the plans he has to move this country in another direction. Without a doubt this election is incredibly important and every citizen from every state has an immense responsibility.
Our country finds itself at a crossroads and we’ll decide on November 6 whether or not we continue to move forward, or whether to decide to return to the policies of the past and turn back on the progress we’ve made. Under our President we have come so far, we have seen so much, and while we are not there yet, we are moving forward, step-by-step. History shines on this moment on our collective journeys and we have an important choice.
Mitt Romney is not that choice.
(Update: Told you so.)
