Romney's Five Point Plan

What is Romney's plan, exactly? He broke it down for Fortune into five categories:1 Below each category is my response in blue.

(1) Aggressively promote domestic energy development, especially fossil fuels. 

How can anyone disagree with developing domestic energy sources? The question is at what cost in terms of the environment and future generations. Our concern should be which presidential candidate will implement the best energy policy for us and future generations. The President has a duty to think beyond tomorrow.

World-wide demand for energy will increase dramatically as more countries develop a middle class. The BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India and China are well on their way to becoming good economic competitors. In 2005 the U.S. consumed 16 times as much energy per capita as did India. They have a population that is roughly 4 times ours. As India becomes more prosperous their consumption rates will get closer to ours. Over the same time period we consumed 6 times more energy on a per capita basis as China. Countries in southern Africa are beginning to experience economic success. It is also easy to envision a time when Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Jordan begin developing a middle class and thus consuming more energy on a per capita basis.

I want a President who is not squandering our future today and thinking about the next generation and the generation after that. Who do you trust to do this; Romney or Obama?

The policy should factor in the sources of energy and the affects on the environment. After all, it is our children and grandchildren we are discussing. I wonder how Dick Cheney would feel if some of this development impaired his favorite trout streams in Wyoming. He may get mad enough where he would consider taking a few oil executives out for some sport shooting.

(2) Expand the market for U.S. goods overseas by negotiating new trade agreements and standing up to China on intellectual-property and currency issues.

The Obama administration is already addressing this issue. This is why Hillary Clinton has traveled more than any other Secretary of State in our history. Negotiating treaties must be done in private. Holding a press conference on a regular basis announcing what we are demanding of other countries, and what they are demanding of us, would be counter productive. Romney knows this.

Can you imagine if, while Romney was at Bain, he held a daily press conference detailing the progress being made in his attempt to buy Staples? The deal would never have happened. It would have broke down and a competitor of Bain would have stepped in and bought Staples.

This country has invested billions, if not trillions, of dollars into technology. Technological development allows us to maintain a high living standard even as it is difficult to compete against the low cost of labor in other countries. Many of our advances made as a country can be attributed to the space program and the development of the internet by scientist working for the government. I would not be typing this on my flat screen monitor if it were not for this nations ability to create useful technology. Steve Jobs and his fellow employees at Apple would never have created that smart phone you have in your pocket if prior presidents did not have the foresight to invest in technology. YES, STEVE JOBS MADE APPLE. He made it utilizing the technology funded by our tax dollars.

 Korea and Japan need to lower tariffs on our auto exports to their countries. The current administration is working on this. I have more faith in Obama to get it done than R&R

(3) Improve workforce skills by transferring job-training programs to the states and going after teachers' unions, which, he says, stand in the way of school choice and better instruction.

This is another one where the devil is in the details. Education, just as defense, is a national issue. If this country is going to maintain a high standard of living, relative to other countries, we need to do everything possible to nurture the greatest asset we have for the future, our children. How are we going to make sure the next Einstein, who may be a person of color, living in inner city Detroit, without a father and with an unemployed mother who has a drug problem, gets properly educated? It would be a great loss to the country if we let that child be sucked into the abyss. We must find a way to save what she has to offer society.

Condoleezza Rice at the Republican National Convention said, "But today, today, when I can look at your zip code and I can tell whether you're going to get a good education, can I honestly say it does not matter where you came from, it matters where you are going? The crisis in K-12 education is a threat to the very fabric of who we are." We need to address this at a national level not only for the sake of the child, but also for the sake of the nation.

I am a firm believer in giving as much power and authority as possible to the level of government that is closest to the people. The problem is each individual should have an equal chance to get a good education.

George Romney's son, who grew up in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, had a much better chance of getting a good public education than the boy who lived eight miles away in Detroit. Further, there is an even possibility that the child living in Detroit, having the necessary skills and attributes, would to be far more successful than Mr. Romney if given the chance. Not only did the young boy in Detroit lose, but so did the nation. We cannot afford to let that happen. The world is too competitive.

 (4) Attack the deficit through budget cuts, not tax increases. 

I see that Romney has already learned the Pledge of Allegiance to Grover Norquist. Personally, I find it scary to see so many politicians take an oath to an individual, and his organization, that may be in conflict with the oath they gave to us voters when we elected them to office. The country has a serious challenge to get our fiscal house in order. It is going to require budget cuts and finding ways to increase revenue. To take tax increases off the table this early in the process is irresponsible. This issue is directly related to number 5 below.

(5), reshape the regulatory climate to "encourage and promote small business" rather than swamp it. 

This is certainly a worthy objective. My problem is how do they accomplish this while R&R is so indebted to the crony capitalists that stand in the way of small business competing. The bribes, campaign contributions, that Romney is receiving from the oligarchs who are taking over our economy will not allow this to happen. These cronies remind me of Don Corleone when he said in the movie the Godfather, "some day, and the day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me." They will be calling on Mr. Romney.

1 Mitt Romney's 5-point plan for the economy, Fortune, August 15, 2012
2 The above is corrected for an error relating yo India's population. It is approximately 4 times that of the United States instead of 10 times as earlier stated.