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News

Marco Rubio wins Florida Senate race – first tea party senator!

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Florida Senator Marco Rubio
Florida Senator Marco Rubio

Here’s the story on Marco Rubio’s landslide victory in the Florida Senate race.

Excerpt:

MARCO RUBIO, REPUBLICAN

An attorney, the 39-year-old Miami native served as speaker of the Florida House and became a rising star in the GOP as a fiscal conservative.

Born to Cuban immigrants, Rubio began his career in public service as a city commissioner in West Miami and entered the Florida House at age 29. Within eight years he ascended from a representative seated by special election to majority whip, majority leader and eventually House speaker.

Fiscal conservatism is the cornerstone of Rubio’s philosophy. He says controlling the national debt and paring government entitlement programs are the most important things lawmakers can accomplish. Rubio wants to reinstate tax cuts for the wealthy enacted under President George W. Bush in 2001 and 2003, slash corporate taxes and eliminate taxes on capital gains and dividend profits. He also supports eliminating the estate tax.

In the Republican primary for the Senate, Rubio initially trailed Gov. Charlie Crist by 30 points. The national GOP quickly embraced Crist, but Rubio overtook him with substantial tea party support. Twice he set records for the most lucrative three-month fundraising periods for a Senate race in Florida, collecting $4.5 million and $5 million, respectively. Crist, meanwhile, turned to a bid as an independent.

Rubio lives in West Miami with his wife, Jeanette, and four children.

Now, we finally get to remove the “to-be” from his blogroll entry which I put there the day he announced he was running for Senate. Mr. Rubio is 39 years old. He’s a star now, and he’s going to go far!

Another tea party senator also won in Kentucky – Rand Paul.

Excerpt:

KENTUCKY:

RAND PAUL, REPUBLICAN

The 47-year-old eye doctor tapped into tea party fervor with a fiercely antiestablishment message. He has strong family ties to politics — his father is Republican Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, a former presidential candidate and libertarian icon.

Quiet and intense, Rand Paul railed against government bailouts and deficit spending in promoting low taxes and limited government. He’s also personally frugal, according to friends who say he mows the lawn at his home in a gated community and shops the Internet for cheap golf shoes.

Paul was born in Pennsylvania, grew up in Texas and settled in Bowling Green, a college town near his wife’s hometown, about 20 years ago. He runs his own ophthalmology practice.

Paul attended Baylor University but left early without a bachelor’s degree for medical school at Duke University. He helped create a certification group for ophthalmologists after objecting to a powerful medical group’s policy.

Paul and his wife, Kelley, have three sons. He has coached youth baseball, soccer and basketball, and his family attends a Presbyterian church, where his wife is a deacon.

He’s only 47 years old!

We also have more new senators in Ohio (Rob Portman), Pennsylvania (Pat Toomey), New Hampshire (Kelly Ayotte), Indiana (Dan Coats), Wisconsin (Ron Johnson), North Dakota (John Hoeven).

Commentary

What would happen if Paul Ryan headed the Budget committee?

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Rep. Paul Ryan
Rep. Paul Ryan

Politico has a profile of Paul Ryan and discusses his policy ideas.

Excerpt:

Ryan will easily win a seventh term in this swing district. But as this budget wonk is poised to take command of the Budget Committee chairmanship in a Republican House, he’s going to have to navigate factions of no-compromise conservatives and angry post-election liberals if he expects to find a Goldilocks-type solution on the federal budget.

Ryan stands to be the most important player in what may be the most consequential budget debate since the government shutdown of 1995. He is perhaps the only Republican in Congress who seems able to negotiate with both John Boehner and Barack Obama, but he still has to prove that his legendary budget expertise can be translated into real action if he’s granted the power of the Budget Committee gavel.

[…]His critics concede that Ryan is the federal official who has offered the most detailed plan — titled the “Roadmap” — that is currently on the table. Democratic budget experts have begun to measure his approach and his skills, but they voice uncertainty over whether they can do business with him.

“Because of Ryan’s open and engaging personality and intelligence, people like to deal with him. But it’s unclear whether he can reach agreement on big contentious budget issues with people on the other side of the aisle who have strong philosophical differences with him,” said Bob Greenstein, executive director of the liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. “Will he be willing, despite the radical nature of his proposals, to work out significant compromises in the next two years? We shall see.”

[…]“Paul is more of a detail guy,” said Mike Sommers, policy director for Minority Leader John Boehner. “The road map takes on big issues in a serious way. It is a logical progression of his work. He is dealing in depth with the leading issue of the day.”

Former Sen. Bob Kasten (R-Wis.), who hired Ryan immediately after his 1992 graduation from Miami (Ohio) University, remains a huge fan. “His road map is the real thing on where we need to go. Even Democrats who criticize him respect Paul Ryan for having the courage to show what needs to be done.” Although many of its details may not survive, Kasten said, “the road map will become overarching in the emphasis on reducing spending in the next two years.”

Asked about Ryan’s deal-making skills, he added, “Obama will have to make a decision. If he continues with his Keynesian policies, it will be a nightmare. … Paul doesn’t want to blow up the government. He wants to see it work in a fiscally responsible way.”

As an undergraduate, Ryan majored in economics and he hoped to pursue further studies in economic modeling, notably on currency forecasting. But his job with Kasten led to staff positions with the late Rep. Jack Kemp (R-N.Y.) at Empower America and then with Sam Brownback of Kansas in both the House and the Senate. He returned to Wisconsin in 1998 to run for an open House seat and was elected at age 28 with an impressive 57 percent win.

If the Republicans take the House, he should be given the Budget Committee gavel.

Videos

Frank Turek and Wayne Grudem think you should go vote today!

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EVERYONE  PLEASE GO VOTE TODAY! (NOVEMBER 2nd, 2010)

Here’s Frank Turek’s post on Jesus, Christians and politics on the Cross Examined blog.

Excerpt:

I often hear Christians claiming that we ought to just “preach the Gospel” and not get involved in politics.  This is not only a false dilemma; it’s stupid (how’s that for direct?).   If you think “preaching the Gospel” is important like I do, then you ought to think that politics is important too.  Why?  Because politics and law affects your ability to preach the Gospel! If you don’t think so, go to some of the countries I’ve visited—Iran, Saudi Arabia, China.  You can’t legally “preach the Gospel” in those countries—or practice other aspects of your religion freely—because politically they’ve ruled it out.

It’s already happening here. There are several examples where religious freedoms are being usurped by homosexual orthodoxy. This summer a Christian student was removed from Eastern Michigan University’s (a public school) counseling program because, due to her religious convictions, she would not affirm homosexuality to potential clients.  A judge agreed (a similar case is pending in Georgia).  In Massachusetts, Catholic charities closed their adoption agency rather than give children to homosexual couples as the state mandated.  In Ohio, University of Toledo HR Director Crystal Dixon was fired for writing a letter to the editor in her local newspaper that disagreed with homosexual practice.

More violations of religious liberty are on the way from the people currently in charge.  Lesbian activist Chai Feldbaum, who is a recess appointment by President Obama to the EEOC, recently said regarding the inevitable conflict between homosexuality and religious liberty, “I’m having a hard time coming up with any case in which religious liberty should win.” So much for tolerance.  The people who say they’re fighting for tolerance are the most intolerant, totalitarian people in politics.

Getting involved in politics is necessary if for no other reason to protect your religious liberty, and the liberties of us all.  So if you’re a Christian, follow the example of Christ—call out hypocrites and fools, and vote them out on Tuesday!

Religious liberty is my top priority and my core value. You can’t preach the gospel without religious liberty – so don’t just stand there and watch it slip away! Get out there and vote! The right to evangelize and discuss Christianity in public is already under attack in places like Canada and the UK! Don’t think that it can’t happen here – it can! Today is the day that you defend the gospel by defending your right to even talk about the gospel in public without having to worry that someone will censor or sue you for offending them. Get out there and vote for your liberty!

Wayne Grudem also encourages you to vote

Should Christian beliefs impact politics?

Do pastors have the right to speak from the pulpit about political, social or cultural issues?

What about the so-called “separation of church and state”?

You can find out more about Grudem’s new book here – it’s a 50+ page excerpt from the book! I’ve got my copy! And you can listen to podcasts from his Sunday School class here.

Frank Pastore thinks that politics flows from theological convictions

Frank Pastore has a Christian radio show on KKLA in Los Angeles.

Here is his post on Crosswalk.com about Christians and politics – specifically, he is responding to critics who say that he should not talk so much about politics on his Christian radio show, and that he should especially not argue about politics.

Excerpt:

Perhaps many Christians believe these things because they don’t understand politics is really an exercise of theology applied—one way we love our neighbors as ourselves. Our political and social policies should grow out of our theology, not vice versa. We are not to reverse engineer our theology based upon our political and social agendas. Our faith is foundational to everything else. For Christians, theology creates and shapes our approach to politics; for non-Christians, politics creates and shapes their approach to theology—or at least their worldview.

A Christian becomes too political when their politics is no longer rooted in their theology, when their faith becomes merely peripheral and unnecessary to their political agenda, rather than the one thing that is fundamental and essential.

How we vote to spend our tax dollars, what economic and social policies we hope to advance through votes for particular candidates, and what domestic and foreign policies we hope our government advances—these things are the applications of the values rooted in our Christian worldview.

Just as how I choose to invest my time and treasure is the best expression of whether I’m living out my Christian values, so too what the government spends money on and what policy preferences it pursues is the best expression of our true American values.

The best way for me to love my neighbor is through those things I choose to do personally. The second best way is through votes for candidates who support policies that I believe will promote the common good. Thus, I am political because I am loving, and I am loving because I am Christian. Therefore, I should argue—albeit in a God-glorifying manner—about politics.

Get out there and vote, people! And make all your friends and family vote, too!

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