The Forgotten Voter

Why don't more people vote Republican? A reader shares his story.

FrumForum is committed to building a conservatism that can win elections and govern responsibly. We received the following letter from someone who does not believe that the Republican Party understands his plight. Consider his story. What have the Republicans offered for people facing these challenges?

You see my family was destroyed financially when my mother was dying of lung disease. My father worked two full-time jobs for thirty years and owned his home yet died penniless and mortgaged to the hilt trying to pay her medical bills. I incurred much of his debt co-signing on that mortgage and my credit has suffered for years trying to help him. My college education was cut short as well.

Over the years the GOP has become too socially conservative for me. When it should have been working harder to grow the middle class and make things like education and re-training more affordable it chose to focus on things like immigration and wedge issues like gay marriage. I think the last straw for me was the Teri Schiavo case. They vilified this woman’s husband and even implied he was responsible for her condition. Yet no charges were filed against him. This is government staying out of peoples lives?!

I don’t blame Republicans for the economic down turn. I do blame them for trying to turn the rescue measures President Bush began and Obama inherited into a partisan game.

Now don’t get me wrong. I do think people should take responsibility for their lives and government can’t fix everything. But I believe government creates the environment for things to happen. Since the Reagan days the middle class has grown smaller and smaller. We allowed our manufacturing sector to disappear without developing anything else to take its place. There has been a disproportionate redistribution of wealth to the upper classes from the middle class. We all know the importance of getting an undergrad education yet our universities are becoming too expensive to attend.

Have the Republicans done anything to help these matters? Of course, but to be honest most of their efforts have been state mandates or token gestures. Pundits use the old fishing story. “If you give a man a fish he eats one night, but if you teach him to fish he can eat his whole life.” Well that is true if he can afford the student loans to pay for fishing school!

So as you can see I’m not the best Republican material.

Thank you

Christopher Hyland