Editor’s Note: “Why You Should Vote For Mitt Romney” is part five of the series “Political Perspectives.”

For this year’s presidential election, my vote was early, confident and Republican. Like countless other young voters, I saw our current economy, characterized by chronically high unemployment, a 15 percent poverty rate, and a 1.5 percent decrease in American median household income, and could not justify giving President Barack Obama a second term.

However, since I am also socially liberal, before the election even began I paid attention when President Obama and his administration characterized Republican candidate Governor Mitt Romney as uncompassionate and radical in terms of his social policies. Yet, during the presidential debate on October 3, American voters experienced Romney for the first time, and the shocking disparity between the real man and the caricature of him that Obama’s administration had conjured was revealed. Romney is not a radical; he is a hard-working and respectable man, and I have confidence in his ability to help this country.

Romney has dedicated his life to saving failing enterprises, a skill our country desperately needs, because the American economy is currently a failing enterprise. Through his work at Bain Capital, the 2002 Winter Olympics and his governorship of Massachusetts, Romney has proven his ability to turn around companies, organizations and states that are on the verge of bankruptcy. Romney entered office when Massachusetts faced a $3 billion deficit, and by 2004, the state had a $700 million surplus; this is in sharp contrast to the fact that Obama has increased the federal deficit by nearly $5 trillion, and that in four years, Obama has only written two budgets, both of which were unanimously defeated by a Democratic Senate.

I have no confidence in Obama’s ability to deal with the economy. In considering the last ten recessions a president inherited from his predecessor, Obama is the only president who, by this point in his first term, had not led the country in a significant recovery. All presidents before him, both Democrats and Republicans, fixed recessions within their first terms. Obama has failed to do so, and instead insists on blaming the Republican Party for blocking his plans, a ridiculous accusation in light of the Democrats’ super majority in the House and Senate for half of Obama’s presidency.

The Obama administration’s constant finger pointing signals its focus on partisanship. In contrast, during Romney’s time as Governor, the Massachusetts Congress was 87 percent Democratic. Romney moved his state forward through his willingness to work with Democrats.

Furthermore, Romney’s economic vision is stronger than Obama’s economic vision, which, as we have seen for the past four years, has produced dismal results. Contrary to popular belief, Romney’s plan does not include lowering taxes for the wealthy; instead, Romney focuses on creating more jobs so that more people are able to pay taxes, lowering taxes for the middle class and eliminating loopholes and deductions for the wealthy. History has shown time and again that encouraging small business, believing in the average American’s ability to innovate and create, produces wealth. Without question, Romney is the better candidate for business growth and the economy.

The General Motors (GM) bailout, touted as Obama’s greatest success, perfectly illustrates the president’s apparent lack of understanding for business. Obama claims to have “saved GM,” but in actuality, he saved only United Auto Workers. When a company goes through bankruptcy, all contractual obligations become null and void, but bondholders’ money is always returned to ensure that people will continue to invest, despite the risk. Obama’s GM bailout skipped over bondholders and instead gave the money to UAW, effectively destroying any confidence in returns through investment, without which most companies cannot survive. Not only that, but Obama seems to have forgotten about the 20,000 nonunion employees that all lost their pensions. I highly doubt they see the GM bailout as a success.

Socially liberal voters also have multiple reasons to vote for Romney. Obama’s characterization of Romney as homophobic and sexist is very troubling (not least because it indicates our president’s inability to run on his own record). I am a fierce supporter of gay rights, and I know many people are hesitant to vote for Romney because, like me, they support gay marriage. Obama, however, reminded us recently that marriage is “defined at the state level” and “to legislate federally is probably the wrong way to go.” In other words, Obama will do absolutely nothing to advance the cause of gay marriage. This allows the socially liberal voter to vote for Romney, a stronger candidate in terms of both the economy and foreign policy, with a clear conscience. Another problem arises, however, for socially liberal voters disappointed by the economy who have been told that Romney is against women. Again, this problem is easily resolved: Romney supports abortion in the cases rape, incest, and a threat to the mother’s life or health. And Romney wants to cut funding to Planned Parenthood largely because our country is bankrupt, not because he hates women.

Finally, I believe in Romney’s ability to lead America on the global stage. During Obama’s presidency, we have turned our back on our closest allies, we have allowed Iran to continue its quest toward obtaining nuclear capabilities and, despite grandiose claims of having defeated Al-Qaeda, the attack in Benghazi revealed that terrorism is still a threat; more significantly, it is a threat Obama and his “lead from behind” philosophy are incapable of surmounting.

So, we must choose as our president someone who understands how to fix the economy, someone who is eager to participate in bipartisanship and someone who will lead our country during a time of international peril. Our current president is unable to accomplish these goals, but I believe Mitt Romney can.

 

Read an opposing article explaining why you should vote for Barack Obama here.

Read parts one, two, three and four of the series “Political Perspectives” here.