I'm tired of talking ideologies. Let's talk specifics.
The more I educate myself about the candidates, the more turned off I am about Romney. And me of all people, living in MA? I'm surprised I didn't realize how poor his economic reputation really is. People talk about his success with Bain capital, but it's not the kind of success or economic know how the American people need, not even close! "I never thought of what I do for a living as job creation. … The primary goal of private equity is to create wealth for your investors." –Marc B. Wolpow, former managing partner at Bain Capital. His legacy in massachusetts was awful (apart from the mandatory healthcare bill he championed and passed, which now to conform to party lines, he has condemned as "socialist." Seriously, this guy has no integrity. It's his own damn policy for god's sake). He championed the outsourcing of jobs (a regular practice and Bain capital to cut costs and increase profit for the higher ups while laying off American workers and sending jobs to India and China. He also vetoed a bill that would make shipping state contracting jobs overseas illegal), he raised the taxes by 750 million, increased debt by over 2.5 billion dollars, and saw a decline in employment faster than the national average.
In what way does that sort of record make him eligible to take over an economy in our shape? I have no doubt he could trim our deficit---at the expense of American people. He is a person who has expertise in creating great profit for the highest tier of a company at the expense of lower level workers. His vague plan for returning Healthcare to the states, while not necessarily a great evil, doesn't have any information on how it plans to save money except for the vague idea that states will be more efficient than the federal government: possible but not necessarily true, and the belief that healthcare shouldn't be mandated is wrong in my opinion. You have to pay for police, you have to pay for firefighters, you have to pay for medical insurance. Do you think you shouldn't have to pay for firefighters because you don't think your house will burn down? I think that state managed healthcare
could cut costs and be more efficient--it's hard to say because Romney has nothing to support that theory except that it seems like it might work. For all we know some states will end up more corrupt than others and end up costing
more money than a federally managed program. I just don't know, and until Romney comes up with a concrete plan that proves that his program will be more efficient, I don't support him. Then again, I can't support him because he doesn't think it should be mandated.
His recent stance on immigration, that he opposes the idea of children of immigrants being allowed to pursue an education, strikes me as little less than heartless unless he comes up with an alternative. He claims to want a better one, but until he
actually comes up with a plan then I will consider him to be failing on the issue of immigration.
His stance on gay marriage is either cowardice or bigotry, pick your poison.
His foreign policy? Very worrying, I think. We already touched on his stance that "we will do what is necessary in Iran" and that "To do anything less than win in Afghanistan is traitorous" (paraphrasing) represents gross lack of knowledge of that area, aggression that will destroy the progress we have made in that region, and of course the fiscal irresponsibility of throwing another trillion dollars at the middle east and the security irresponsibility of antagonizing that region. What does a venture capitalist know about foreign policy, other than sending jobs that America needs overseas? Does he know more than a president of four years of experience in the middle east? I do not want to trust Romney with sensitive national security and diplomatic issues abroad. Period.
People argue against Obama's spending--
compare his spending with Bush's! What many people cite as "increases" are actually decreases from the trend that was in place before he was elected. If I'm losing ten dollars a month and then the next person comes in and trims the loss to five dollars a month, is it very fair for the opposition to say "he's costing us five dollars a month!" Hate on the bailout--it was set in motion by Bush, not Obama. It's a republican championed program until a Democrat became president. Then it was an abomination.
So, ultimately, I disagree with most of his policies. And really, I'm starting to disagree with
him as a person. I don't think he has very much integrity. He condemns a policy he championed for years in order to align himself with the Republican party. He outsourced American jobs. Bain capital cannibalized some companies in a major way, and it's hard to argue their goal wasn't to create more wealth for the already wealthy in the short term at the cost of middle workers. (Maybe in the long term, when the company was more profitable it would have paid off, but that wasn't really Bain capital's issue, was it? They were just about jacking up profits.) I think that it's very wrong that he opposes gay marriage. I don't like the amount that he panders to different audiences and flip flops. All politicians do it, but he's made an art out of it during this election. He is an incredibly wealthy man who owns six multi million dollars houses; what does that say about personal character? I don't like that much myself.
I'm voting, this is my first election. I'm trying to be as knowledgeable about this as I can be, so please, let me know how you respond to this and support Romney. I'm not leering, I'm genuinely trying to understand. Half of our country isn't stupid, this isn't good versus evil. I think there must be extremely valid reasons to believe that Romney should be president. I just can't seem to find them.
Respond to my wall of text,
if you dare...