This could be the most important aspect of your vote.
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Friday, October 26, 2012
PLEASE READ AND HEED
Thursday, October 25, 2012
The Most Important Article I Have Ever Written posted on October 25, 2012 by David Bahnsen
No, the title of this piece is not intended merely to be an
attention-grabber. I really, really mean it. I have written a lot of
things over the years, and I have felt (and continue to feel) very
strongly about a lot of things. But as we enter the very final stretch
of the 2012 Presidential election, I have to make one last stab at
articulating the crucial nature of voting Barack Obama out of office.
The reality of our two-party system means that if my last sentence is
correct (and it is), then so is this sentence: It is of dire
significance that we vote FOR Gov. Mitt Romney.
I am not writing this piece for those on the far left. I hope many of you will stay home and sit this election out, as you surely must be very disappointed with your President, who has not closed Gitmo, who has ordered 10x the drone attacks that President Bush ever ordered, who orchestrated the assassination of a man (Osama bin Laden) without a trial, who extended all of the Bush tax cuts for two years when he had the majority in both chambers, who passed health care legislation that was stripped of the public option, who never even proposed immigration reform to the Congress, who spent 275 days of his Presidency opposed to gay marriage, who has still not ended the war in Afghanistan, who has never passed a budget (or received a vote for one) … That’s right – as contemptible as I find the President to be, I can only imagine what you far leftists must think. Yikes. What a disappointment. And if it isn’t, what a bunch of hypocrites and posers you are.
I am also not writing this piece for folks like me on the right. We know that class warfare is a recipe for failure. We know that Obama loathes the principles that have made America great. We know that his Supreme Court appointments have been an utter embarrassment. We are well aware of the path to fiscal ruin this President has our country on. There is no need to convince you of his disdain for an American footprint in the world. We know the failures of his stated energy policies. We know that he views the tax code as a means of forcing his version of social justice upon society. We have seen the laughingstock appointments he has made in Steven Chu, Eric Holder, Van Jones, and countless others. And most importantly, we know the doom for America that his signature legislation represents – the atrocity that is ObamaCare. We conservatives do not need to be talked into fearing an Obama re-election. In fact, I have been very restrained in keeping this paragraph short.
This article is, instead, for those who are just simply not enthused about voting for Mitt Romney. You may not be thrilled with the idea of voting for Barack Obama, and in fact, you may be repulsed by it. However, for any number of reasons, you feel uncomfortable with a vote for Romney, and are considering sitting this one out or voting for a third-party candidate. It could be the Mormonism of Gov. Romney you do not like, or it could be his various position changes over the years (most notably on abortion). Particularly in states like Nevada, Ohio, Colorado, and Wisconsin, your non-vote for Romney could very well put Obama back in the White House for an additional four years. You are the target audience of this article.
I am not going to defend every single piece of Mitt Romney’s record. I have spent a little time with the Governor over the last few years, and I have found him to be an extremely bright and knowledgeable man, but I would not say that ideological conservatism runs through his veins. I doubt he grew up reading Hayek, Kirk, and Buckley. For those of you who are devout evangelicals or Roman Catholics, you are well aware of the differences in his religious viewpoint from yours. He has some stinker votes out there, and he has changed his position on a couple key issues over the years. It is not possible for me to claim he is a perfect man, or a perfect candidate. But I will suggest to you that the negativity some feel towards him is perhaps misguided …
The most common objection lodged against him is his reputation as a “moderate” when he governed the state of Massachusetts. When a Republican Governor is elected head of Ted Kennedy’s state, and asked to serve over an 82% Democratic legislature, I would suggest to you that a little grace and understanding are in order. If you evaluate each and every action he took as the Governor of that state, you will find (as I did) that he was constantly moving his state to the right, even if it never went as far right as you and I may prefer. He is a true incrementalist, and he moved the ball in the right direction, which I believe is what we elect leaders to do.
I would spend more time on the abortion flip-flop except for the fact that I have no doubt that his “pretend position” was when he was pro-choice, not when he became pro-life again. It is inconceivable that he and his devout Roman Catholic pro-life Vice-Presidential selection, Paul Ryan, would select judges who set the pro-life cause back. I have been wrong on issues in the past, and so have you. I encourage you not to hold it against a candidate that before he was right on an issue, he once was wrong. That is backwards thinking, is it not?
I have written in the past of the very limited things a President can actually do. He cannot restore the size of government to the “right size” many of us wish it to be. He can, though, work diligently and intelligently to get the right things done. I would suggest that some of those crying needs of the hour are exactly what Romney will do, and do phenomenally well. He will work with Congress to reform (but not perfect) the tax code. He will reverse the direction of the budget deficit, even if he will not solve it entirely.
The direction he will take the fiscal state of our country vs. Obama is the most important issue in this election. He will flatten the tax rates, which undeniably spurs economic growth, all the while cleaning up many of the silly and price-distorting deductions that have to be reformed (I learned this from Obama’s former economic czar, Christina Romer, by the way). He will assemble a team of competent cabinet members, as he has done his entire career (do any of Romney’s critics want to criticize his eye for talent at Bain Capital, or in Salt Lake City, or in the Governor’s mansion?). Obama has filled his cabinet with cronies, fools, and extremists. This distinction alone is enough to show up and vote.
I do not believe we will run a budget surplus in four years, and I do not believe abortion will be criminalized at the end of Romney’s first term. What I do believe is this: At this time, at this point in history, in this present set of circumstances, God has seen fit to give us a clear and simple choice between a radical, unqualified, dishonest wretch of a President named Barack Obama, and a competent, managerial, efficient, intelligent, decent man named Mitt Romney. Mitt Romney will be a tool God uses to move the ball down the field.
Romney did not have to choose the extraordinary Paul Ryan as his running mate, and in fact took great political risk in doing so. Gov. Romney is a problem-solver in a country filled with problems. He is not a quintessential conservative Libertarian kind of guy, but he is the antidote we have to the Ivy League radicalism of Barack Obama. He is the alternative to four more years of $1 trillion+ deficits and an utter blindness to the train wreck our entitlement system represents. He has the proven ability to work with other people to accomplish something, as opposed to the community organizer we have in office now who has never so much as led a school sports team, let alone a business, a state, or an organization.
I am not writing because Mitt Romney is perfect. I am writing because he is good enough. And I am writing because Barack Obama is the biggest disaster our country has faced as a mature country. If you worry about the direction of the Supreme Court, and you worry about the size of our government relative to GDP, and you worry about confidence in the business community coming back so as to spur economic growth, then you have a man to vote for who will advance your cause(s) – Mitt Romney. You also have a man to vote against who represents the worst of all possible worlds – Barack Obama.
Please, do not sit this one out. Our country – the last, best hope on earth – needs your vote. I have every confidence in the world that we will be pleased we voted for Mitt Romney – every confidence in the world. Share as you wish. And I will see you at the polls.
David L. Bahnsen, CFP®, works as a Senior Vice President in the private client group of one of the premier Wall Street firms in the country where he provides financial planning and investment management services to individuals and families. To receive his Viewpoint Updates via email, go to DavidBahnsen.com
I am not writing this piece for those on the far left. I hope many of you will stay home and sit this election out, as you surely must be very disappointed with your President, who has not closed Gitmo, who has ordered 10x the drone attacks that President Bush ever ordered, who orchestrated the assassination of a man (Osama bin Laden) without a trial, who extended all of the Bush tax cuts for two years when he had the majority in both chambers, who passed health care legislation that was stripped of the public option, who never even proposed immigration reform to the Congress, who spent 275 days of his Presidency opposed to gay marriage, who has still not ended the war in Afghanistan, who has never passed a budget (or received a vote for one) … That’s right – as contemptible as I find the President to be, I can only imagine what you far leftists must think. Yikes. What a disappointment. And if it isn’t, what a bunch of hypocrites and posers you are.
I am also not writing this piece for folks like me on the right. We know that class warfare is a recipe for failure. We know that Obama loathes the principles that have made America great. We know that his Supreme Court appointments have been an utter embarrassment. We are well aware of the path to fiscal ruin this President has our country on. There is no need to convince you of his disdain for an American footprint in the world. We know the failures of his stated energy policies. We know that he views the tax code as a means of forcing his version of social justice upon society. We have seen the laughingstock appointments he has made in Steven Chu, Eric Holder, Van Jones, and countless others. And most importantly, we know the doom for America that his signature legislation represents – the atrocity that is ObamaCare. We conservatives do not need to be talked into fearing an Obama re-election. In fact, I have been very restrained in keeping this paragraph short.
This article is, instead, for those who are just simply not enthused about voting for Mitt Romney. You may not be thrilled with the idea of voting for Barack Obama, and in fact, you may be repulsed by it. However, for any number of reasons, you feel uncomfortable with a vote for Romney, and are considering sitting this one out or voting for a third-party candidate. It could be the Mormonism of Gov. Romney you do not like, or it could be his various position changes over the years (most notably on abortion). Particularly in states like Nevada, Ohio, Colorado, and Wisconsin, your non-vote for Romney could very well put Obama back in the White House for an additional four years. You are the target audience of this article.
I am not going to defend every single piece of Mitt Romney’s record. I have spent a little time with the Governor over the last few years, and I have found him to be an extremely bright and knowledgeable man, but I would not say that ideological conservatism runs through his veins. I doubt he grew up reading Hayek, Kirk, and Buckley. For those of you who are devout evangelicals or Roman Catholics, you are well aware of the differences in his religious viewpoint from yours. He has some stinker votes out there, and he has changed his position on a couple key issues over the years. It is not possible for me to claim he is a perfect man, or a perfect candidate. But I will suggest to you that the negativity some feel towards him is perhaps misguided …
The most common objection lodged against him is his reputation as a “moderate” when he governed the state of Massachusetts. When a Republican Governor is elected head of Ted Kennedy’s state, and asked to serve over an 82% Democratic legislature, I would suggest to you that a little grace and understanding are in order. If you evaluate each and every action he took as the Governor of that state, you will find (as I did) that he was constantly moving his state to the right, even if it never went as far right as you and I may prefer. He is a true incrementalist, and he moved the ball in the right direction, which I believe is what we elect leaders to do.
I would spend more time on the abortion flip-flop except for the fact that I have no doubt that his “pretend position” was when he was pro-choice, not when he became pro-life again. It is inconceivable that he and his devout Roman Catholic pro-life Vice-Presidential selection, Paul Ryan, would select judges who set the pro-life cause back. I have been wrong on issues in the past, and so have you. I encourage you not to hold it against a candidate that before he was right on an issue, he once was wrong. That is backwards thinking, is it not?
I have written in the past of the very limited things a President can actually do. He cannot restore the size of government to the “right size” many of us wish it to be. He can, though, work diligently and intelligently to get the right things done. I would suggest that some of those crying needs of the hour are exactly what Romney will do, and do phenomenally well. He will work with Congress to reform (but not perfect) the tax code. He will reverse the direction of the budget deficit, even if he will not solve it entirely.
The direction he will take the fiscal state of our country vs. Obama is the most important issue in this election. He will flatten the tax rates, which undeniably spurs economic growth, all the while cleaning up many of the silly and price-distorting deductions that have to be reformed (I learned this from Obama’s former economic czar, Christina Romer, by the way). He will assemble a team of competent cabinet members, as he has done his entire career (do any of Romney’s critics want to criticize his eye for talent at Bain Capital, or in Salt Lake City, or in the Governor’s mansion?). Obama has filled his cabinet with cronies, fools, and extremists. This distinction alone is enough to show up and vote.
I do not believe we will run a budget surplus in four years, and I do not believe abortion will be criminalized at the end of Romney’s first term. What I do believe is this: At this time, at this point in history, in this present set of circumstances, God has seen fit to give us a clear and simple choice between a radical, unqualified, dishonest wretch of a President named Barack Obama, and a competent, managerial, efficient, intelligent, decent man named Mitt Romney. Mitt Romney will be a tool God uses to move the ball down the field.
Romney did not have to choose the extraordinary Paul Ryan as his running mate, and in fact took great political risk in doing so. Gov. Romney is a problem-solver in a country filled with problems. He is not a quintessential conservative Libertarian kind of guy, but he is the antidote we have to the Ivy League radicalism of Barack Obama. He is the alternative to four more years of $1 trillion+ deficits and an utter blindness to the train wreck our entitlement system represents. He has the proven ability to work with other people to accomplish something, as opposed to the community organizer we have in office now who has never so much as led a school sports team, let alone a business, a state, or an organization.
I am not writing because Mitt Romney is perfect. I am writing because he is good enough. And I am writing because Barack Obama is the biggest disaster our country has faced as a mature country. If you worry about the direction of the Supreme Court, and you worry about the size of our government relative to GDP, and you worry about confidence in the business community coming back so as to spur economic growth, then you have a man to vote for who will advance your cause(s) – Mitt Romney. You also have a man to vote against who represents the worst of all possible worlds – Barack Obama.
Please, do not sit this one out. Our country – the last, best hope on earth – needs your vote. I have every confidence in the world that we will be pleased we voted for Mitt Romney – every confidence in the world. Share as you wish. And I will see you at the polls.
David L. Bahnsen, CFP®, works as a Senior Vice President in the private client group of one of the premier Wall Street firms in the country where he provides financial planning and investment management services to individuals and families. To receive his Viewpoint Updates via email, go to DavidBahnsen.com
Could 2012 be America 's Last Presidential Election?
By Michael Savage
I've asked this question to a number of people and most of them respond as if I were crazy. They tell me that this is America , land of the free, and that there will always be elections. I tell them that we are no longer the land of the free and that if Obama gets re-elected in 2012 that this just may be America 's last election.
In the past three years, the Obama administration has been very carefully crafting the nation for a political take over by his Marxist regime and this isn't just my opinion.
Popular radio talk show host (of the Savage Nation on the Talk Radio Network), Michael Savage, is the son of Russian immigrants and is very familiar with Soviet and European history. Savage warned his listeners this week saying, "I have to tell you that if this man, God forbid, is the next president of the United States , we're going to be living in something along the lines of - people say - Europe . I don't believe it's going to be like Europe - I think it will be closer to Chavez's South American dictatorship.
"This is the most corrupt, incompetent, dangerous tyrannical administration in American history. It's not politics as usual. It's not just Democrats versus Republicans. Obama has a long history of being at odds with American values and with America itself and the core principles of this country. They don't want government-sponsored opinions. They only want government-sponsored 'Pravda.' That's exactly what the government-media complex tells you on a daily basis - nothing but the government-media complex party line. Pay attention! Your freedom may be at stake!
Former Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum told a small group of people in an Iowa coffee house "Barack Obama is not incompetent, ladies and gentleman. He knows exactly what he's doing and why he's doing it. He sees America differently than you see America ."
Obama has gone out of his way to divide this country in a way I haven't seen since the Great Depression when Franklin Roosevelt went around to divide his country. That's his hero. What makes America great in Obama's mind is that the government takes money from somebody and gives it to somebody else. No, that's what makes America , France .
"With his control over the Executive and Judicial branches of the government, the stage is set for a complete takeover of the government. Think about it! Since taking office, instead of helping the economy, Obama has purposely escalated the economic crisis by plunging the country into unprecedented debt. He has a number of programs that are designed to go into effect in January 2013, just in time for his second term of office. The economic burden and increased taxes on everyone will be enough to cause the final economic collapse of the country. As soon as that happens, Obama declares Martial Law and assumes dictatorial control of the nation.
The Department of Justice has already been subverting federal laws to strip us of a number of freedoms. The Supreme Court and many of the other federal courts have been seeded with socialistic liberal judges that will rule in Obama's favor on virtually anything, thus ending constitutional rule and law.
He's already changing the face of America 's military. Changing the retirement program is causing many conservative military leaders to resign commissions and leave the military. Some Pentagon officials are also noting that an increase in the enlistment of radical Muslims into the US military where they get all the training they need on weapons and defense systems. We have no idea how many of them there are in the armed forces or in what positions they may hold.
Obama has been wielding executive powers this past year as if he were already a dictator. When Congress is not doing his bidding, he simply bypasses them and uses an executive order to accomplish it anyway. This has set the stage for his disbandment of Congress. He would not be the first world leader to take control of a nation and disband the legislative branch of government.
He has been effectively using the media to anesthetize the public to the dangers he poses. Like a patient being prepped for surgery, people are numb to the changes and won't have a clue what took place until they wake up in recovery and realize that free America has been removed and replaced with a regime that may parallel those of Stalin, Lenin, Mussolini, Hitler, Chavez and Castro.
For the sake of our children and grandchildren, I earnestly pray that we are spared from what seems a certain future and that Obama is overwhelmingly defeated in 2012. Otherwise, heaven help us.
P.S. I would like to thank the owners of savewestyork.com for reminding me I have a blogspot account. I forgot it was here, but now I can post to it regularly. Thanks Chuck, Brian, and Joe.
Shane Louthian
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