I hope this email finds you well. After a year and a half of eighteen hour days campaigning on the road before the Primary, I made the most out of the summer by spending much-needed quality time with my husband and children. I’ve enjoyed every minute of eating three meals each day at our own kitchen table, playing games, swimming, hiking, and laughing with my family. It has been wonderful!
At the same time, I’ve spent a lot of time praying and reflecting on what my campaign accomplished, and on what you’ve meant to me during the campaign. I shared my thoughts on my personal Facebook page recently. If you missed it, the Virginia Conservative blog posted it, so you can read it there. I received a tremendous response from my posting, and I would love to hear from you as well. However, I am writing to you now for a different reason. Please allow me to explain.
It’s no secret I’ve been a harsh critic of George Allen’s past record of spending and debt. As you know, I have always pushed for responsible fiscal policy to benefit families, businesses and our nation as a whole. Win or lose – – a primary election challenge to George Allen was important to confront the issues of excessive spending and accumulating debt in our own party. Likewise, I didn’t rush to endorse George Allen after he won the Republican Primary in June, simply because I couldn’t endorse any candidate who didn’t have the strong resolve to tackle our debt crisis.
I endured some criticism for not endorsing George Allen right away, but I’m a big girl and I’m not shaken by it. I don’t take endorsements lightly and I simply refuse to engage in politics for politics’ sake. This isn’t a game; the future of our nation is on the line.
Several weeks ago, I met with George Allen and his campaign manager. I explained the concerns you and I share about his prior record of spending and debt in Washington. As you’ve heard me say many times, “if we don’t deal with spending, nothing else is going to matter.” You know I’m a crusader on this issue.
During our meeting, I said I have always appreciated George Allen’s opposition to higher taxes and his determination to exploit the energy resources we have in our Commonwealth. However, I asked him to define concrete proposals to tackle the looming financial crisis.
In short, I offered an endorsement for George Allen on two conditions. First, he had to put on paper substantive plans to curtail spending and reign in the federal debt. Second, I needed to see him publicly herald those plans in his campaign as a demonstration of his commitment to them. To his credit, he has done both.
Recently George Allen sent me a four-page document detailing short and long term proposals to address spending and debt. Frankly, I was encouraged by what it contained. We would benefit greatly from many of the items he proposes, like capping spending at 19% of GDP, stopping earmark spending, freezing federal hiring, rolling back to 2008 spending levels, blocking Medicaid grants to the states, reforming Medicare to return control to individuals, reforming social security by raising the age for the younger generation to keep it solvent for them, and supporting the REINS Act to stop the very expensive, freedom-robbing overregulation by federal agencies. Since putting his plans on paper, he has promoted it in several public forums – – promising to work toward solving our nation’s financial crisis.
I’ve heard positive reports from several people who’ve seen him promote his plan in private meetings as well as public forums. I’m encouraged by Allen’s substantive proposals, and I believe you will be, too.
Allen’s proposals are far better than the government-driven, tax-and-spend ideas advocated by Tim Kaine and Barack Obama. Nobody should believe that Tim Kaine is fiscally conservative! I have no doubt that Tim Kaine and Barack Obama, if elected again, will destroy our economy through their job-killing Keynesian economics that suppresses individual achievement. You only must look back at the last four years to see the abuse we have taken under their failed leadership. You can read, for yourself, Allen’s positive plan for fiscal recovery here.
Based on George Allen’s newly detailed plans to restore fiscal sanity to Washington, I endorse George Allen. I wanted to write to you, to let you know first. I’m excited about the opportunity to help take this message across Virginia. Voters need to know that George Allen is committed to responsibly and immediately tackling this looming financial crisis.
I hope you will join me in helping George Allen defeat Tim Kaine over the next few weeks. You did so much for my campaign by knocking on doors, contributing financially, and phone banking. In the counties where we had a strong ground game, we did very well. I don’t have to exaggerate to say that this election could literally come down to a few thousand votes, since all the pollsters are projecting a very close outcome. Your help could be the difference in avoiding further fiscal calamity and greater threats to our freedoms.
I will be doing a number of events between now and November 7th. I hope you will join me in promoting fiscal sanity in this November election and offer your support to George Allen for U.S. Senate.
I look forward to seeing you on the campaign trail!
All my best,
Jamie
