Representative Ryan,
I’m a 25 year old technology entrepreneur originally from Milwaukee, WI. I went to school at the University of Wisconsin and have stayed in Madison after graduating in 2009 to start another web business.
I’ve followed your career with interest since I first heard about you sometime during high school. I’ve always been impressed with your views on the economy and your willingness to propose solutions to issues that other politicians have been unwilling to take on. This is exactly what we need from our politicians.
It was great see you take on some of the political third rails of our budget process when you released your Roadmap for America. While I don’t agree with everything in your new budget proposal, I’m extremely happy to see you proposing real solutions to the huge problems we face as a country.
I’m writing today to tell you to keep up the good work, but I also want to implore you to not fall into the trap of veering right on the social issues and falling into the religious right. I talk to business people all the time who would love to support you and your ideas and view you as one of the only competent politicians in the United States today, but if you start talking the talk of the religious right, you’ll lose much of this support. Don’t get co-opted like the Tea Party did.
I’m not telling you to change what you believe in. I believe that our fiscal problems are the single biggest threat to the United States and believe that if nothing is done, we’ll turn into a third world country, complete with huge inflation, income inequality and a huge underclass of unemployed people.
I don’t know what you believe on abortion, gay marriage, don’t ask don’t tell, drug legalization, creationism or any of the other religious right issues and honestly I don’t care. Just focus on the economic issues and you’ll likely have my support, along with a huge amount of business people who want to support you.
Simply saying, “I don’t support abortion and gay marriage, but the biggest problem facing the United States is our budget deficit, national debt and the economy. I want to fix these huge problems first before we talk about these other important issues,” will give you huge credibility and I think it’s what the country needs. While I will disagree with you on most of those issues, I’m willing to overlook it if you don’t veer extremely right and make it a focal point of your platform. Please don’t fall into the trap John McCain fell into in the last presidential election.
Please continue to focus on economic issues and continue to represent Wisconsin well, especially tonight when you give the response to President Obama.
8 Comments
so what did you think of his response to the state of the union? Did you freeze just a little in your gut (as I did) when he quoted the psalmist in his expression of sympathy with the families of the people who died in AZ? I suppose one could quote anything, but to immediately jump to something religious was off-putting and makes me worry where he might be headed to gain additional support.
yea, it looks like he’s already going down the religious right path. republicans don’t think they can win without pandering to the religious right and they might be right because of our primary system.
overall, the focus on cutting spending now doesn’t do much for me. it’s a rounding error on the overall problem which is healthcare and social security and probably defense. It’s not a bad idea to cut current spending, but if we’re not tackling our biggest problems, it’s not gonna do much.
“Large federal entitlement programs—Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security—threaten to bankrupt the United States if their costs are not curbed, and will become unsustainable due to unabated expansion in years to come.”
Rep. Ryan claims to support big cuts in government spending, but was not active about cutting spending when Republicans were in charge. He supported the huge 2003 Medicare expansion, and expensive No Child Left Behind Act in 2001. He supports the expensive War on Drugs. In 2008, he put hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars at risk by voting for the massive TARP bailout, and voted to spend billions on the bailout of GM and Chrysler. I find Congressman Paul Ryan’s hypocrisy appalling.
Just a month ago, Congressman Ryan voted for the tax compromise that included a big increase in unemployment spending, and even extensions of government spending on ethanol.
He, like most Congressional Republicans, talk about cutting spending and the federal deficit, but do not follow through on tough votes or when in possession of power.
My take is that he’s at least willing to look at ideas outside of the mainstream. I don’t think I can name 5 more politicians on either side of the aisle who are willing to do the same. I have some hope he’ll be able to do better, but i’m not holding my breath. Afterall, he is a politician, just like the rest of them.