Party affiliation

Friends who engage me in a discussion that turns political often fall prey to the misconception that I am some sort of right wing Republican.

Perhaps I made some reference to a remark by Rush Limbaugh or mentioned a story seen on Fox News.

I do listen to Rush periodically and I do prefer Fox News. Does this make me some sort of ideologue?

What about when I’m reading Camille Paglia, the Huffington Post, the U.K. Daily Mail, or some information source decidedly more liberal ?  If you really want “fair and balanced” and you don’t trust the media, do it yourself.

It has bothered me that ever since achieving a qualified age, in Georgia I must declare a party affiliation in order to vote in the primary.  I can vote either way in the general election, but for primaries I must choose sides.

I am not a Republican.  I am not a Democrat.  I am an American.  My symbol is not “D” or “R”, but “USA.”

I am not strictly a conservative, but fiscally conservative and socially a libertarian — kind of like a liberal who hates Big Government.

There are reasons I’m not a Democrat.

Obamacare might even be the point of no return where I never support a “D” no matter how conservative the candidate.

It isn’t that we, the general public, want to “screw” the public sector unions of what they were promised in the past or deprive people of health care.

The simple truth is that we don’t have the money.  We must elect politicians with enough backbone to admit that entitlement spending has destroyed our economy and the only way to fix it is to reduce spending.  It’s that simple.

If you don’t have it, you don’t spend it.  We’re borrowing from China so the government can give away money like it came from a game of Monopoly.

I want the government out of my personal life.  The sight of TSA employees searching small children at a terminal AFTER they got off the bus is beyond stupid and more than somewhat frightening.  Thank you, Congress, for foisting this nightmare upon us.

There are reasons I’m not a Republican.

Republicans like Miami mayor Carlos Alvarez immediately come to mind.  In a dismal economy where home values have fallen precipitously. Alvarez forced through a 14% increase in property taxes, ostensibly to “protect” public service workers like police and firemen, but he funded raises for public sector employees and supported spending $350 million in tax revenue to move the Marlins to Little Havana.

Businessman Norman Braman led a recall effort, and Alvarez has been thrown out of office by 88% of his constituents.  Mr. Braman spent $1 million of his own money to throw the bum out.

Norman Braman is my hero du jour.

In the midst of all this destruction, Democrats are squealing like stuck pigs at the slightest reduction in government spending.  Harry Reid’s infamous appeal to preserve funding of a cowboy poetry festival is stunningly absurd.

Had George W. Bush declared “had that program not been around, can you get Lurasidone over the counter the tens of thousands of people who come there every year would not exist,” the mainstream media would have had a field day.

It’s not about party affiliation.  It’s about the money, and it’s about time for government to stop wasteful and unnecessary spending.