What Are Your Big Three Issues?

 

shutterstock_222116386Too many voters choose candidates for stupid reasons. “Which candidate would I rather have a beer with?” Or, “I want to be part of history and elect the Historic First Woman/African-American/Transgender-Atheist-Vegan-Differently-Abled-Muslim-Illegal-Immigrant™.” Or, “He’s angry for the same reasons I’m angry!” But there a few of us left who care about philosophy, policy, and other stuff that isn’t cool. And while there’s a broad range of issues to consider, one can usually boil it down to three issues of paramount importance.

What follows are mine. What are yours?

  • Immigration: I want current law enforced until such time as the law is reformed. The law should be reformed to make illegal immigration as difficult as possible, and limit legal immigration to a level that is socially and economically sustainable.
  • Constitutional and Human Rights: I want uncompromising support for Constitutional Rights. In a candidate, I want a commitment to appoint and fight for strict Constitutionalist judges.
  • Regulatory and Agency Reform: The Regulatory Apparatus of the Federal Government should be pared down severely and future major regulations subject to Congressional approval.
Published in Domestic Policy, Foreign Policy
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  1. Bryan G. Stephens Thatcher
    Bryan G. Stephens
    @BryanGStephens

    V the K:Too many voters choose candidates for stupid reasons. “Which candidate would I rather have beer with?” Or, “I want to be part of history and elect the Historic First Woman/African-American/Transgender-Atheist-Vegan-Differently-Abled-Muslim-Illegal-Immigrant.” Or, “He’s angry for the same reasons I’m angry!” But there a few of us left who care about philosophy, policy, and other stuff that isn’t cool. And while there’s a broad range of issues to consider, one can usually come down to three issues of paramount importance.

    These are mine. What are yours?

    • Immigration: I want current law enforced until such time as the law is reformed. The law should be reformed to make illegal immigration as difficult as possible, and limit legal immigration to a level that is socially and economically sustainable.
    • Constitutional and Human Rights: I want uncompromising support for Constitutional Rights. In a candidate, I want a commitment to appoint and fight for strict Constitutionalist judges.
    • Regulatory and Agency Reform: The Regulatory Apparatus of the Federal Government should be pared down severely and future major regulations subject to Congressional approval.

    I agree with 1 and 3.

    My number 2 is a renewed American Nationalism, which embraces a robust foreign policy. In short, I want Reagan’s approach to the world, except without backing down (as he did after Beruit), and bombing those who take hostages, instead of selling them arms.

    • #1
  2. Manny Coolidge
    Manny
    @Manny
    1. Pro-Life.
    2. Sound economic policy.
    3. Energetic foreign policy that maintains world stability.  Or at least tries.

    There would be several corollaries to those three points that would require action on other issues.  Like for no. 3, a strong military.  Or low taxes for No. 2.  Pro-life is definitely my number one issue.

    • #2
  3. The King Prawn Inactive
    The King Prawn
    @TheKingPrawn

    Constitutional government seems the umbrella under which all other issues reside for me. Well before government asks if it should do a thing it should ask whether or not the thing is even permissible. Most of what government does would never pass that test.

    • #3
  4. BrentB67 Inactive
    BrentB67
    @BrentB67

    The King Prawn:Constitutional government seems the umbrella under which all other issues reside for me. Well before government asks if it should do a thing it should ask whether or not the thing is even permissible. Most of what government does would never pass that test.

    Put me down with King Prawn for my #2

    1. Immigration/National Sovereignty

    3. Balanced budget this year, surplus next and address national debt.

    • #4
  5. Vice-Potentate Inactive
    Vice-Potentate
    @VicePotentate

    I’m not sure how specific I need to be. Is economics too broad a category?

    Anyway, in a very particular order.

    1. Abortion – I’m opposed to it in almost all cases and willing to compromise to get the number down as quickly as possible.

    2. Entitlement reform – Entitlement spending has the capability to completely collapse the republic. It’s going to be a long fight and why Republicans need long lasting majorities and not just electoral results this cycle.

    3. The responsible nomination of justices to the Supreme Court. – This measure has the chance to put the brakes on whatever spews forth from the progressive maw for the next twenty years. I don’t want to see that opportunity go to waste.

    • #5
  6. Barkha Herman Inactive
    Barkha Herman
    @BarkhaHerman

    My only issue that may get me to the polls this year is the size of the Government.  If there were a real chance of shrinking (does not equal slowing the growth of) the Government, I would vote.

    • #6
  7. Randy Weivoda Moderator
    Randy Weivoda
    @RandyWeivoda

    1. The national debt.  If this country ever falls, it won’t be brought down by Islamic terrorists, Mexican immigrants, or too many gay people getting married.  We will be crushed under our debt and it will be our own damn fault.

    2. Respect for constitutional limits.  No president is going to bring us back to a pre-New Deal government in 8 years, obviously.  But he or she could at least veto further violations of the 10th Amendment, and perhaps undo at least a little of the damage done in the last 80 years.

    There are many other important issues, but these are at the top of my list.  My ideal presidential candidate would have the campaign slogan, Mind Your Own Business.

    • #7
  8. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte
    1. Size and scope of government
    2. Size and scope of government
    3. Size and scope of government

    If this is addressed (for realz), 90% of everything else takes care of itself.

    • #8
  9. Robert McReynolds Member
    Robert McReynolds
    @

    Getting rid of Obamacare, illegal immigration, and debt.

    • #9
  10. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    So far, most of what I see here could be summed up as the rule of law. That is my number one. I’m tempted to put it as numbers 2 & 3, too, but…

    1. The Rule of Law
    2. Repeal of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Amendments. It was a bad era for amendments. We already repealed the Eighteenth. Then there is the Nineteenth, of course…
    3. Economic Freedom
    • #10
  11. Guruforhire Inactive
    Guruforhire
    @Guruforhire

    1.) Fix SS

    2.) Maintenance and restoration of the social trust

    3.) We ought not slaughter an order of magnitude babies than the holocaust.

    • #11
  12. Hartmann von Aue Member
    Hartmann von Aue
    @HartmannvonAue
    1. Life Issues- abortion, euthenasia-
    2. Foreign policy/national defense
    3. Economic reform- which is a Dachbegriff as we say for regulatory and tax reform.

    That’s it i brief.

    • #12
  13. Hoyacon Member
    Hoyacon
    @Hoyacon

    I’m tempted to regurgitate Charlotte’s answer, but

    1. Reform personal and corporate tax code.
    2. Not only reduce the administrative state, but make the electorate understand it’s a good thing,
    3. Border security.
    • #13
  14. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte

    Hoyacon:

    1. Not only reduce the administrative state, but make the electorate understand it’s a good thing

    And there’s the rub.

    • #14
  15. Vance Richards Inactive
    Vance Richards
    @VanceRichards

    Is debt still a thing? Because I don’t hear any politicians talking about it.

    • #15
  16. Vance Richards Inactive
    Vance Richards
    @VanceRichards

    Charlotte:

    1. Size and scope of government
    2. Size and scope of government
    3. Size and scope of government

    So, what’s your number 4?

    • #16
  17. Randy Weivoda Moderator
    Randy Weivoda
    @RandyWeivoda

    Vance Richards:Is debt still a thing? Because I don’t hear any politicians talking about it.

    Rand Paul has talked about it at the debates.

    • #17
  18. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    Vance Richards:Is debt still a thing? Because I don’t hear any politicians talking about it.

    It most certainly is. Even if John Adams is as dead as Abe Vigoda, he wasn’t wrong about debt.

    • #18
  19. Solon Inactive
    Solon
    @Solon
    1.  Sex
    2. Drugs
    3. Rock n Roll
    • #19
  20. Arahant Member
    Arahant
    @Arahant

    Solon:

    1. Sex
    2. Drugs
    3. Rock n Roll

    So, Libertarian?

    • #20
  21. aardo vozz Member
    aardo vozz
    @aardovozz

    Solon:

    1. Sex
    2. Drugs
    3. Rock n Roll

    I guess Keith Richards gets your write-in vote.

    • #21
  22. I Walton Member
    I Walton
    @IWalton

    All of the above.  What they all have in common is the drift, now stampede away from the constitution and limited government.  At the heart of all of it is the belief that government can fix human frailty, error, mistakes, reform human nature, stimulate the economy, foster innovation.   The founders knew better and we’ve undermined what they did.  So the question is where do you begin to dismantle the administrative state?

    Toss the tax code and adopt something simple like Cruz’s, toss the regulatory regime, one bad law after another and put some real rules and barriers against its growth while we systematically dismember it.  Cruz also proposes this.  This is why the establishment hates Cruz and will embrace Trump.

    • #22
  23. John Seymour Member
    John Seymour
    @

    Arahant:

    Solon:

    1. Sex
    2. Drugs
    3. Rock n Roll

    So, Libertarian?

    I think that makes him a Republican Party Reptile, right?

    • #23
  24. Nick Stuart Inactive
    Nick Stuart
    @NickStuart
    1. Prevent the Clinton Crime Family™ from getting their hands on the presidency where they will have virtually unlimited access to the public purse, and the mechanism of the Federal Government to reward their friends and punish their enemies.
    2. Strong national defense, because if we don’t have that nothing else really matters (I view the debt crisis as a national defense issue, but that’s another post)

    I would put “Right to Life” at the top of the list, but since Reagan all the Republicans have done is be a tiny speed bump. The Democrats have been “all abortion, all the time.” There’s no point wanting something that isn’t going to happen.

    • #24
  25. Johnny Dubya Inactive
    Johnny Dubya
    @JohnnyDubya

    I like your three, but I would expand the third to encompass smaller government in general, including fiscal sanity and reduced spending.

    A “lesser” issue that I am nonetheless quite passionate about is tax simplification. The Byzantine tax code is an outrage. Nothing to me exemplifies the ruling class’s contempt for the taxpayer better than the accretion of complications in the code. I believe that no one should have to pay an expert to file their tax forms.

    • #25
  26. Casey Inactive
    Casey
    @Casey

    Charlotte:

    1. Size and scope of government
    2. Size and scope of government
    3. Size and scope of government

    Thank you for your submission. While you submitted your request in triplicate as outlined in Section 34.b.3a, you did not provide a signature on line 64f.  Pursuant to the ipso facto in Addendum 12, we must reject your request.

    We invite you to apply again using our easy online tool with the link provided in Appendix A of the supplementary documents made available to you free by mail when including self-addressed stamped envelope.

    ☆Please think about the forests before printing this message.

    • #26
  27. John Seymour Member
    John Seymour
    @
    1. Pro life – see the Catechism of the Catholic Church; although I don’t think it ever makes sense to execute children for the crimes of their fathers, I can support a candidate on other grounds who takes the standard three exceptions: life of mother, rape, incest.  Otherwise this is a deal breaker.
    2. The most conservative candidate who is electable, which raises problems this time out – Trump is not a conservative, Rubio seems as squishy on due process as he is on immigration and seems to want to replicate the foreign policy of the Bush 43 administration.  That leaves Cruz.  I agree with him on most issues, but I am not sure he is electable.

    For sorting out number 2 (in the unlikely event that there are multiple candidates that meet that criteria by the time the primaries get to Florida), I would have the following priorities:

    a) Pro-growth policies – the only way out of our various economic messes is growth – it must be job 1.

    b) a commitment to the rule of law and constitutionalism.

    • #27
  28. Tom Meyer, Ed. Member
    Tom Meyer, Ed.
    @tommeyer
    1. Entitlement reform. We’ve created a doubly horrible system where tens of millions of people — and I’m talking about middle class retirees as much as poor folks — are dependent on federal welfare programs that we can’t afford. These programs don’t work (as in, they’re going to run out of money), are offensive to freedom, and aren’t even plausibly constitutional.
    2. A clear, steel-eyed foreign policy based on national interest. W.’s administration was a mess, but Obama has made things orders of magnitude worse. Keep things simple: Make it abundantly clear, through action, that harming American citizens is a guarantor of an early and a bad end; Meaningfully support our allies when they come to harm; Subservient to the above, try to expand the number of places that are worth building a life in.
    3. Returning of constitutional order. Congress needs to step up and learn how to pass a real budget on time. Likewise, whomever becomes president needs to understand that executive orders are not permanent law and that he cannot invade countries without congressional approval.

    If any of these happen in the next four years without causing any great harm, I will be ecstatic. If any two of them happen, I’ll start believing in miracles.

    • #28
  29. John Seymour Member
    John Seymour
    @

    Casey: ☆Please think about the forests before printing this message.

    Go ahead and print, I own timber interests.

    • #29
  30. dbeck Inactive
    dbeck
    @dbeck
    1. Free Stuff.
    2. Let the great great great grand kids pay for it.
    3. More free stuff.
    • #30
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