Thursday, October 11th, 2012
An Ohio welcome
Warm Romney reception at cold Shelby County Fairgrounds
By Eric Adams
Photo by Eric Adams/The Daily Standard
"Four more weeks" was the chant heard repeatedly at Mitt Romney's rally Wednesday night in Sidney.
SIDNEY - Four more weeks.
The phrase was echoed numerous times at the Shelby County Fairgrounds on Wednesday evening as Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney made a campaign stop. An estimated 10,000 supporters packed the venue, undeterred by the windy, frigid October weather.
Ohio Sen. Keith Faber, R-Celina, delivered an introductory speech in which he expressed his confidence that if all voters "along the golden highway of I-75" cast their ballots for Romney next month, he would become our next president.
Romney began his speech by numbering the great economic issues in America, issues he feels have worsened due to the current administration.
He cited statistics like a $50,000 median income among American families - a $4,000 drop during the last four years. He cited health insurance premiums that have increased by $2,500 despite Obama's promise they would decrease by that much. He cited the fact that 23 million Americans are out of work, and one in six families lives below the poverty level.
"The president's answer to all this is to say he's going to save Big Bird," the former Massachusetts governor said referring to a comment he made during the first presidential debate that government shouldn't fund the public station that airs Sesame Street. "It's time for a president who's going to save the American family."
Romney made no jokes about his projected state of America with another four years of Obama's leadership.
"We'd see chronic unemployment continue, we'd see high gasoline prices continue, we'd see incomes continue to go down (and) the kind of fiscal crisis here that's happening elsewhere. We can't afford four more years of Barack Obama," he told the crowd.
The presidential hopeful also pointed out the stark differences between his methodology for helping the middle class and Obama's. Romney promised to lower taxes on entrepreneurs and to completely repeal the "death tax," an estate tax that makes it more costly for local farmers to pass their properties on to the next generation.
He also advocated the use of American resources such as coal, oil, nuclear and renewables to reduce overseas energy dependence.
"There's a lot of manufacturing associated with our energy sector," Romney said. "We've lost over half a million manufacturing jobs; having low cost energy (will bring them back)."
He also promised to open up more trade, particularly with Latin America.
"We're all very excited about (trade with) China. Latin America has an economy almost the size of China's; (we can't) forget the folks next door," he said.
The third component of a proposed five-step Republican plan was to decrease bureaucracy and overhead among federal training programs.
"There are 47 different federal training programs reporting to eight different federal agencies," he said.
Romney intends to take each state's "fair share" back from these programs so the money can be used to create jobs for the people who need them.
Romney also spoke about capping federal spending and increasing support for small businesses, from which 2/3 of American jobs are generated. He said it is morally wrong to spend "our kids' future" and that small business owners should see the government not as an opposing force but as an ally.
In addition to explaining his policies, Romney described the people who inspired him during the campaign. He referred to a meeting he had at the Republican National Convention with Jane Horton, the wife of Army sharpshooter Chris Horton who died in Afghanistan.
Protestors from Westboro Baptist Church stood outside Horton's funeral holding offensive signs and shouting anti-American slogans. Yet, when Jane Horton was approached about this, she simply said, "Chris died so people like them could protest."
Romney said he was deeply touched by her courage.
"This is the character of America," he said. "We're a big-hearted people."
Photo from Associated Press
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks during a campaign rally at the Shelby County Fairgrounds on Wednesday in Sidney.