Saying No to Mitt Romney

     It is High Time for the GOP to Turn the Page on the Romney Chapter 

by Lee Edward Enochs

President,

The Princeton Conservative Club

"The best government is the least amount of government."

I wear many hats in life. Besides being a graduate student in the bitterly cold North East, I work full-time at a  grocery store in Princeton, New Jersey, blog about politics, theology and national events incessantly, shoot irrelevant and inane videos, host a daily podcast, write and publish books and attempt to cause Libertarian chaos wherever I may roam. I am also the President of the Princeton Conservative Club and will try to chime in on political issues facing American conservatism when time and God permits.

Recently, I read a report that Mitt Romney is seriously considering running for President again. While I held my nose and voted for him the last time, I will not vote for him again. If Mitt decides to run again, this will be his third time around. 

Don't get me wrong, I personally like Mitt Romney and voted for him over Barack Obama in 2012. I know that might shock some of my new progressive friends I have made on the east coast and even further startle those who know my views on small-government and minimal-state Libertarianism.

 I like Mitt Romney because he is a genuine family man who loves his wife, children and grandchildren. I also like Romney because he said he would end Obamacare as soon as he took office.

However, I have not always been of the Libertarian mindset. While I am a life-long Republican, for years I followed the party line and voted for whatever slop the GOP nominated whether that was hacks like Bob Dole, George W. Bush, John McCain and yes, Mitt Romney.

(I am particularly pissed off at George W. Bush for essentially for spending like a mad man and for betraying his professed small government views by spending trillions of dollars on wars we should have not been involved in at all. I also fundamentally disagree with his "Patriot Act," which causes us to lose of civil liberties and personal dignity every time we are groped, probed and assaulted at the airport by the TSA).

While I like Mitt Romney personally, I believe there is no good reason for the Republicans to give him a third crack at the White House. As far as I am concerned, he is just recycled news at this point. It is time for the GOP to move on and look for a true, blue small government conservative. Romney is anything but a minimal-state advocate as his record shows as a one term governor of Massachusetts.

Besides, let's face it folks, Romney was often out of touch with reality and ran a very bad campaign against Obama in 2012. While his choice of Paul Ryan was a very good one, he ran a uneven campaign. His own "Romneycare" policy in Massachusetts made him seem like a hypocrite in contending against Obamacare. 

The worst thing about Mitt Romney's Presidential campaign against Obama is that he could have won. I believe this with all my heart. Yet, after his initial successful debate against Obama, he let his foot off the gas for some reason and did not go after Obama's record with the fervor he needed as the underdog. He also allowed mediocre campaign strategists to convince him that he had the Presidential campaign locked up when anything but was the case.

Romney often seems to live in some sort of out of touch reality distortion field, and seems clueless how to be aggressive when he needs to be. He should have thrown everything he could at Obama, but he just lobbed softballs at the President. That alone is inexcusable and is reason enough for the Republican Party faithful to reject him. Just because he has all the money in  the world to run a political campaign does not mean he should.

No, it is time for a new a more authentic conservative to arise to the challenge. One that will sincerely champion a minimal government and balanced budget approach and actually go after the Democrats with unbridled intensity when it counts. Romney failed at this badly and it caused him to lose an election he could have won and this is just intolerable.