We know what Mitt Romney thinks about “borders.” On Jan 2nd the Cape-Cod Carpetbagger suddenly become a Utahn after speding most of his 71 years elsewhere.

 

Here are my views.

• Borders define a country. As Trump said, “We either have a country, or we don’t.” Well, we do.
  
  
• Physical borders protect a country and its citizens.
  
  
• Open borders put Americans at risk by allowing entry to terrorists and other bad actors. There are currently large swaths of US territory along the southern border that are under the control of drug cartels. This situation is outrageous and unacceptable. To borrow Mitt’s phraseology, we need to start “excluding” these cartels from control over our borders.
  
  
• Physical borders both reflect and help preserve common culture. Common culture promotes trust between citizens and fosters a voluntary, cooperative sense of community. Those are critical underpinnings of a free and virtuous civil society.
  
  
• Those who disrespect our borders also disrespect our country, our culture and our citizens.
  
  
• The borders should be secured with a variety of technologies and methods, including—but not limited to—walls, electronic surveillance, and man power.
  
  
• Illegals cost American taxpayers around $135 billion per year. The cost of securing the border is far lower and will essentially be repaid in only a few months time.
  
  
• End sanctuary states and cities. Not only are they unconstitutional, but they put American citizens at risk.

 

 

On February 22nd, 2018, KSL (local NBC news affiliate in Salt Lake City) asked Mitt Romney about his position on gun control—especially with respect to the young voices calling for more restrictions and laws on law-abiding citizens in the wake of the Parkland shooting. He responded, “We’re gonna have to deal with it, we’re gonna to have to take action.”

Mitt Romney’s first instinctual response to children was to offer big-government solutions that could infringe the 2nd Amendment rights of Americans.

Here’s my response.

• A government of, by and for the people is not just a quaint phrase. The ultimate power of this government resides with the people.
  
  
• The people have the inherent right to defend themselves.
  
  
• The rights recognized by the 2nd amendment are not up for debate.
  
  
• The “arms” mentioned in the 2nd Amendment specifically refers to weapons of war and measures of defense. Therefore, the so-called “assault weapons” ban is unconstitutional (as is the assault rifle ban).
  
  
• The answer to the “gun problem” is not to abridge 2nd Amendment rights, rather it is to increase and promote responsible and respectful gun ownership and use. Individual Americans are ultimately the very last line of defense against all enemies foreign and domestic. I advocate that as many citizens as possible should own, respect, and responsibly use firearms.
  
  

• • I know no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education." —Thomas Jefferson
    
    

• Both the federal and many state governments do too much to infringe upon the right of the people to bear arms. Instead of discouraging citizens from exercising this right, the proper role of government—as outlined by Jefferson above—is to educate, educate, educate. If anything, the government should take a more active role in helping citizens obtain firearms and learn to use them responsibly.

 

School Safety

 

• Leaving schools unguarded and/or undefended is simply not acceptable anymore.
  
  
• Here are some methods of protection/prevention that I support—always with the blessing and input of those most local to the situation. Whereas the government repeatedly failed the kids at Parkland (and elsewhere), some of these solutions would have saved lives.
  
  
  • Installing secured entrances/exits, like controlled-passage man-traps.
    
    
  • Providing space for actual police to perform their administrative duties so that someone in uniform is always on the premises.
    
    
  • Oklahoma has begun to install bullet-proof storm shelters in classrooms. I expect this solution to spread to other states.
    
    
  • Paying/contracting experienced gun-users to patrol schools, such as retired law enforcement.
    
    
  • Installing metal detectors.
    
    
  • Since staff and teachers are the last line of defense, they should not be overlooked. With the proper training, some of them can be armed. For example, teachers in Texas can attend an 80-hour intense firearms training course from a certified law enforcement academy in order to become certified “school marshals.” I would also issue them bullet-proof vests.
    
    
  • Red-Flag or “Gun Violence” Restraining Order (GRVO) laws. This is not my preferred solution, and I definitely DO NOT favor a national GVRO law like the one that Marco Rubio and Orrin Hatch are working on in the senate. First, the federal government is prohibited from infringing on this right by the constitution. I also don’t favor a national, one-size-fits-all law because 5 states already have differing GVRO laws and its unclear if any of them work.  example, Connecticut has a Red-Flag law, but it did not prevent the Sandy Hook shooting. A GVRO law would also not have prevented the Parkland shooting, as we now know it was multiple failures of government that led to that tragedy. There’s no reason to think the federal government would “get it right,” nor guaranty that local government would succeed where it has failed so many times in the past. However, if states do pass these laws, I recommend that they include very strong constitutional safe-guards along with a built-in sunset provision.
    
    

• Simply putting up signs that say “Gun Free Zone” is completely irresponsible and a gross dereliction of duty.

 

 

 

 

Since Senators are instrumentally involved in foreign treaties and therefore foreign policy, it is important that they have the right constitutional perspective and decision-making paradigm. This is a huge strike against Mitt Romney as he’s failed several times recently to demonstrate the ability to make the right suppositions and choices and stand up for Americans. Here’s a short summary of some of those instances:

1. He buckled on the national stage when it came to the truth about Benghazi in the debate against Barack Obama. That was a watershed moment when he lost the respect and support of many Americans.
   
   
2. He told Ted Cruz he was wrong when Ted said the Iran deal would end up financing terrorism. We now know that it has. Ted Cruz was right, Mitt Romney was wrong.
   
   
3. When it became known that the FISA “process” was subverted by the Obama administration to spy on Trump, and that Congress and Trump had approved the release of a memo summarizing those abuses, Mitt Romney advised Trump to NOT release it.
   
   
4. While President Trump has tried to stop the inflow of Islamic terrorists and other criminals into the United States (including the bloodthirsty Mexican gang MS13), Mitt Romney has criticized him for speaking with a tone of “exclusion.”
   
   
5. He embraces the increasingly fanciful notion that Russia interfered with the election, going so far as to say that Russian bots are already spreading false information on him and his current Senate campaign. This is a Democrat talking point. Well, I assure you Governor Romney I am not a Russian bot.

 

Mitt Romney’s foreign policy sensibilities are a disaster. Now, here are mine.

• I favor the America-first foreign policy of Donald Trump and the Peace-Through-Strength philosophy of Ronald Reagan. Trump’s policies have defeated ISIS and brought North Korea to the table. Reagan’s kept America safe from the expansionist scourge of hard communism and helped usher in an unprecedented era of global peace.
  
  
• We should have military capabilities second to none.
  
  
• I will work to end the unconstitutional and ill-advised deal the Obama administration made with Iran. Mitt Romney, on the other hand, defended the deal.
  
  
• We should remember that everything we do should be done first with our own citizens, culture, and way of life in mind. Again, America is not a global welfare program. America and its citizens are the priority. We must adjust our domestic policies to stop prioritizing and upholding special accommodations and dispensations to foreigners, their languages and cultures, over American citizens, and our language and culture. Mitt Romney does not believe this and will promulgate policies and ideas that do not prioritize Americans.
  
  
• A country’s strength and vitality flows from energy. America should be second-to-none when it comes to energy resource development. I support the full opening of ANWR, expansion of off-shore drilling, expanding natural gas export infrastructure, and a resurgence of nuclear power. Since we have the largest coal reserves in the world, we should ease the regulatory burden so that we can exploit that advantage. Besides, nobody does coal cleaner than the United States. Our reliance upon energy from countries whose cultures and own foreign policies are antithetical to our own forces us to negotiate from positions of weakness and forge deals with bad actors. Rather than supporting those who interests naturally align with ours, we end up supporting their enemies. Ex: We are way too cozy with Saudi Arabia and its royal dictators who sponsor much radical Islamism and global jihad, even within the borders of the United States.
  
  
• The theft of American technology by countries like China must end, or at least be severely reduced. Rather than expending so many resources on the unconstitutional domestic mass surveillance state, I favor a shift towards securing the nation’s domestic and military cyber infrastructure.
  
  
• We are in a state of technological cold-war with China. Besides providing China with our best technology (either through ill-advised sharing or porous security), our debt payments to them have basically funded their massive military modernization and build-up.
  
  
• I do not favor involuntary nation building. The state of perpetual war that American forces around the globe find themselves in must end. Not all countries want democracy and/or representative government of the American variety. We must recognize and acknowledge that some cultures are simply incompatible with ours.
  
  
• The United Nations is a globalist monstrosity and den of thieves. It provides a platform to evil dictators, tyrants and oppressors of humanity while diminishing those who strive for equality and freedom. It’s also a mechanism through which anti-American globalism operates. Not only does the United States not receive an acceptable return on its UN investment, but it funds and upholds those whose designs are directly opposed to the goals and existence of America. We should withdraw from the UN. In its place, we should create and expand organizations and alliances with nations and cultures whose goals are aligned with our interests.
  
  
• Finally, we must revise and reorganize our intelligence organizations and apparatuses. The FISA court is nothing but a rubber stamp that does nothing to protect the rights of American citizens. We now know the Obama administration abused it to spy on and attempt to subvert the Trump campaign. We still don’t know what the State Department was doing in Benghazi that got Ambassador Stevens killed. The CIA, NSA, FBI and other agencies seem to be out of control and more obsessed doing the will of globalist overlords and insider cronies than protecting the American people.

 

 

Here are my thoughts:

 

• I applaud the Trump tax reform and the value it has already helped release from the economy. However, we must do more to let people keep the property that they earn with their lives, labor, time, sweat and blood. Our personal property does not belong to the government.
  
  
• According to Americans for Tax Reform, in 2012 Americans had to work until July 15th! to pay the entire cost of government. We worked 88 days to pay for federal spending; 40 days for state and local spending; and 69 days for total regulatory costs. More than half of our life’s output is confiscated by government. This disgraceful immorality must end.
  
  
• Having progressive (i.e. punative) tax brackets and punishing people who earn more is antithetical to the American principles of liberty, self-determination, free-market enterprise, private property ownership, and equality before the law.
  
  
• I favor either a low national-consumption tax or a low flat tax, but not both simultaneously. American citizens are constantly asked to do more with less. It’s time the government got on the same program.
  
  
• I favor moving “tax day” from April 15th to the Monday before election day in November.
  
  
• Obviously, large spending cuts should be tied to tax cuts as well. In keeping with my slogan—Make American Government Local Again—property, power, and responsibility need to be shifted back to the states, municipalities, and especially the people.

 

 

 

Keep My Voice (Caucus/Convention) vs Count My Vote (Collect signatures, get on primary ballot)

 

Those who opposed SB54: Count My Vote warned that outside interests could come to Utah and use star power and money to “buy” an election. Just 4 years after its passage we already see that prediction coming to fruition. Only 2 months ago Mitt changed his residence on Twitter from Massachusetts to Holladay, UT, and announced his intent to run for the US Senate. Now he’s gathering signatures to guarantee he’ll be on the GOP primary ballot instead of risking the caucus/convention system which ensures extreme vetting of candidates. Since many Utah GOP conservatives are not fans of Mitt Romney, he’s using his name recognition from previous presidential runs and the Olympics (over a decade-and-a-half ago) to simply bypass the scrutiny of the convention system. For those who want to reduce money in politics or who want to maintain local influence and accountability, this is a disastrous development.

 

Here’s my position:

• I’m a passionate advocate for the/caucus convention system. I favor the repeal/overturning of SB54.
  
  
• The Utah state GOP is a private organization and has the right to decide how candidates representing the party get on the primary ballot.
  
  
• The passage of Count My Vote was an action of gross legislative overreach. It’s also a violation of the 1st Amendment right to freedom of association, and I hope the court overturns it.
  
  
• The caucus/convention system ensures that candidates will be closely and comprehensively vetted to a more extreme degree than they are by a simple ballot primary process. That is what Mitt Romney is afraid of. He knows he will have a more difficult time persuading the GOP state-delegate “jury.”
  
  
• High turnover rate of the several thousand state delegates from cycle to cycle means that the process is actually harder to “fix/rig” than a basic primary ballot—where money and name recognition can easily carry the vote, a la Mitt Romney.
  
  
• Count My Vote has already started undermining the caucus/convention system as many donors now require the candidates they support to collect signatures to guarantee they are on the primary ballot. Without the need to do well at the convention, there’s less meaningful engagement with the state delegates, and therefore lower-quality vetting of candidates who collect signatures.
  
  
• The Utah election process is now being transformed from a matter of building local consensus to one of fundraising from special interests outside the state. This shift undermines Utahns’ right to self-determination and subverts the principles of sound representative government.