I had a hard time deciding whether or not to write this, let alone whether or not to post it. This is a POLITICAL post, and so if that will bother you, please feel free to not read it. But I don’t think anyone can argue that politics are outside of the realm of the personal or the financial, so in that sense, this belongs here.

What I say here shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who has met me or even read this blog for longer than a month or two. But while you will certainly be able to tell how I voted after reading this, my goal here isn’t to convince anyone else to vote as I do, and there will not be any discussion of individual candidates. I’m more putting into words my overall political convictions, my belief of how government should work.

At the same, I am very well aware that the fact that government doesn’t work exactly the way I think it should is probably a good thing. Just like in personal finance, I am not an expert. I am simply one person, with one opinion, and for a country of our size to work and succeed, we need many people, with many opinions, working together to try and find the best solutions for all of us.

 

Equal Rights Up until this year, I would have told you I wasn’t a single issue voter. I am fairly fiscally conservative but very socially liberal. If I thought there was a viable candidate who would honestly look at our spending and cut responsibly across the board- no sacred cows, like defense –they’d probably get my vote, even if they were cutting social programs, too. (And yes, I’m aware that some of the third party candidates hold this view, but we are currently stuck in a 2 party system, and so that’s the system I mostly operate under.)

However, this year, I’ve come to understand that there is one issue that turns me into a single issue voter- civil right, equal rights. In all honesty, I’d be screwed if we had one party who was pro gay rights but anti birth control and abortion, while the other party was pro birth control and abortion by anti gay rights. Luckily for me (though maybe not for the country- I think we could get some really thoughtful discussions about equal rights out of that dynamic) that is not the case, and so, it is easy for me to make my decisions.

I do not believe the government has a right to treat any adult citizen differently from any other adult citizen. That means I don’t think they should have any say in who marries who, and it also means that I don’t think a woman loses sovereignty over her own body simply by becoming pregnant. (Given that, I actually have more respect for pro-life politicians who don’t have rape exceptions- either abortion is murder or it’s not, and I don’t believe it should be considered justifiable homicide to kill a child for the crimes of a parent.) I believe the decision of what to do with a woman’s body belongs to the woman alone, to make in consultation with those she chooses to consult, but that the government has no place in that decision. Just as I believe that who I marry is no one’s business but ours, in consultation with our God and our Church (if we happen to believe in a God and/or are members of a church) and none of the government’s business.

 

Separation of Church and State That said, in my mind, government should never be involved in religious marriage to begin with. Actually, let me restate, government should never be involved in anything religious, ever. I am an ardent supporter of the separation of State and Church. I do not believe religion has any role in running our government, nor do I believe that belief in a particular religion, or any religion, is required to make someone a good and moral person. Knowing the difference between right and wrong does not require a specific, or any, religious text.

It bothers me very much that we have a de facto religious test to get elected to the highest offices in this country. We have never had a Jewish President. Can you even imagine a Muslim thinking about running for US President in today’s climate? It was a huge deal when JFK, a Catholic, was elected. And today, there are people who will vote against Romney simply because he is LDS. In my ideal world, once a person chooses to run for office, no mention of their religion should be allowed in any official campaign materials- from either side. I don’t think anyone should have to stop going to church or to deny their beliefs, but in a country that professes to have separation of State and Church, I want those in my government to understand what separate means. Your religion should never decide my laws.

Societal Responsibility To go along with that, I believe it is government’s job to care for the least among us. On a message board earlier today, I mentioned that I believed it was society’s job to care for the least among us and someone argued against me that government is not society. I have to respectfully disagree. We live in a republic where all adult citizens have the right to vote and to choose their government. That means government is the ultimate reflection and construct of society.

Our government is the structure we have set up to care for the common good- be it military defense, firefighters, education, social security or healthcare. This is the structure society has put in place, and therefore, I do not believe that its duties should be farmed out to private companies. I do not believe in private prisons or police forces any more than I believe that we should leave it to private charities or religious organizations to care for those who need our help. (And going back to my point about separation of State and Church, I believe it is NEVER appropriate for the government to relinquish it’s duties to the populace to a religious organization.)

I am not against private entities existing to offer the same (or better) benefits the government does, but I don’t believe that the government should dimply step out of an area of the common good to let private organizations handle it. This means I believe in FEMA. I do not believe in people saying “leave it to the Red Cross”. I believe in government run homeless shelters- I do not believe in the idea that that is best handled by the Union Gospel Mission or the Salvation Army. I am not discounting any of the good work done by these organizations. I am just against our government farming out it’s duties to care for the common good to other organizations.

I may have mentioned this before, but one of my favorite billboards of all time came from when I lived inReno. On US 395, just before theMoana Lane exit, there used to be this sign that read “Nevada’s Beer Distributors- supporting local schools and roadways through taxes”. I loved that they were trying to take credit for simply paying their taxes. And yet, that’s also how I believe it should be. We should all be supporting our society through taxes. I do not believe that leaving it up to individual discretion (as we do when we count on people to donate to charity) is an acceptable way to care for our citizens. Nor do I believe we should put essential services in the hands of private organizations whose responsibilities are to shareholders. Essential services belong in the hands of the government which has to answer to all citizens, not just to the pocketbooks of a few.

 

Education I do not believe everything is the responsibility of the federal government. I truly wish people paid as much attention to their local governments- city, county, state –as they do the national elections. So much of our lives are ruled by where we live, and yet, we like to blame (or credit) only the most visible of our elected leaders.

At the same time, I also believe that some things need to be run outside the local municipality. I tend to want to scream at someone anytime I hear of a school district refusing to teach evolution. I don’t necessarily believe there should be a national curriculum. However, I do think there need to be some standards for what getting a public education in this country looks like.

If a parent really disagrees with sex ed or evolution, let them find out when those subjects will be taught and pull their kid out of school that day, but personal religious beliefs should not be allowed to set curriculum for entire schools or school districts or the text books that school districts all over the country buy.

Earlier this year, one group of parents inTexas put together an agenda for their school board to adopt (luckily, it failed) that included the idea that it wasn’t the job of schools to teach children to think.

I want you to stop and think about that for a moment. What does it say for our country when going to school in Mississippi means you never learn evolution, when going to school in a certain community inTexasmeans you only learn rote memorization? What does it mean when if your parents are programmers at Microsoft, your public school offers 20 different advanced and AP classes, but if your parents are teachers, your school can only afford to offer 10 advanced classes, and if your parents work on an assembly line, your school doesn’t offer any advanced classes, even though none of these schools are more than 15 miles apart? Are some of our students less deserving of a good education simply because of where they live?

How can we call this equality of opportunity, when there is nothing equal about it?

 

Did you survive the rambling?

There are a lot of other things I believe in, but these are the big ones- equal rights under the law, separation of State and Church, societal/government responsibility, and education. These are the main factors that shape how I vote, and help shape the finances of our country and all of us.

What are the main factors that shape your vote? (You don’t have to mention where you stand on them, if you don’t want to.) I ask, because just like with personal finances, I don’t believe that we can learn anything if we aren’t willing to talk about it, and talk about all sides of it.