Commentary: How Obama Has Failed America

The Romney campaign's deputy policy director outlines why the Republican candidate offers a brighter future.

Last week’s debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney has brought the presidential race into focus. In 2008, many Americans were inspired by the possibility and hope President Obama offered. But after four years of disappointing results, we have to choose between four more years of the same failed policies or a new course that can deliver real opportunity and a brighter future.

Whether we’re talking about jobs, health care, debt, taxes or foreign policy, President Obama doesn’t have a record to run on or a plan to turn things around. If he is re-elected, we will have four more years of the last four years, with a stagnant economy and a foreign policy that makes the world less safe.

Fortunately, Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are offering exactly what our nation needs — real reforms for a real recovery. When Mitt Romney is president, our nation will have pro-growth policies that foster upward mobility — and lift people out of poverty — and we will ensure peace through American leadership and strength.

A look at the results of four years of an Obama presidency shows the damage his policies have done to our country. Under President Obama, Black unemployment has increased to 13.4 percent. The unemployment rate for Black teens stands at a shocking 36.7 percent, and a quarter of Black families are in poverty. 

Unbelievably, during his second term President Obama will keep piling on the taxes, regulations and debt that have ground our recovery to a halt. This includes devastating tax increases that will kill more than 700,000 jobs. To make matters worse, he also stood in the way of the Keystone pipeline and domestic energy production, but at the same time spent billions of taxpayer dollars subsidizing Solyndra and on clean energy stimulus projects, some of which sent jobs overseas.  

The Obama recovery is not working, but we can do better.

In sharp contrast to Obama’s failed policies, Mitt Romney’s Plan for a Stronger Middle Class will create 12 million new jobs and deliver rising incomes. We will achieve this growth by reforming the tax code, lightening the burden of federal regulation and expanding domestic energy production. He will approve the Keystone pipeline — in order to lower energy prices and make sure that thousands of Americans can be working on a pipeline instead of standing in an unemployment line.

Beyond jobs, taxes and energy, this election will determine the future of other parts of our society. If President Obama is re-elected, millions of Americans could lose the health insurance that they like, $716 billion will beraided from Medicare to pay for the President’s health care law and health premiums will continue to skyrocket. Mitt Romney will ensure Americans can keep their insurance and protect Medicare by repealing the President’s health care law and replacing it with health care reform that provides better care at lower costs.

The failed recovery and fruitless government spending has come at a large cost. During the past four years, President Obama has racked up more than $5 trillion in new debt. In a second term he’ll let our debt climb to $20 trillion. This is debt that will burden current and future generations for decades to come. Mitt Romney will cut spending back to the historical norm, get the United States on the path to a balanced budget, and get our country’s AAA credit rating back. 

While the choice in this election has consequences for our nation’s future, it will also hit your wallet next January. President Obama has already raised taxes 21 times. In a second term, he will raise taxes by another $2 trillion. An independent, nonpartisan think tank has estimated that the debt added during President Obama’s first term and the debt that would be added according to his own budget in a second term will result in a $4,000 tax increase on middle class families. As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney cut taxes 19 times. When he is president, Mitt Romney will not raise taxes on anyone, and he’ll deliver tax relief for the middle class.

President Obama’s foreign policy has placed America and our allies at the mercy of events and those who mean to do us harm. He has downgraded our relationship with our allies, failed to develop a strategy that protects and advances our interests in the Middle East, and he has put our nation on track for massive cuts to the defense budget that will endanger our national security.

Mitt Romney will provide the leadership needed to shape world events and protect our interests and our ideals. He will reverse the president’s defense cuts and he will never apologize for America’s values and beliefs.

This election is a choice between two very different visions for our nation’s future. We don’t have to continue down the path we’re on: a path of unfulfilled promises and lowered expectations. By voting for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, we can build a real recovery that creates jobs, strengthens Medicare and protects ourselves and our future shared prosperity. 

Jonathan Burks is the Deputy Policy Director for Romney for President, Inc.

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