"The Pursuit of the
Difficult
Mitt Romney’s
Remarks to CPAC 2009
February 27, 2009
[As
Prepared for Delivery]
Thank
you all very much. It’s good to see all of you, and to be among so many
friends. Being at CPAC feels a bit like coming home. Your enthusiastic
send off three years ago propelled my campaign to the top of the pack.
That status turned out to be temporary, of course. And when the journey
was over, both Ann and I were filled with gratitude for your friendship
and loyalty. It warmed our hearts, and we thank you. A lot of you have
been asking how Ann is doing. And I’m happy to say she’s doing
great.
There are so many conservative leaders here this weekend. I was looking
forward to seeing Governor Palin again. There’s a rumor that she has
been offered an 11-million-dollar book contract. My publisher has been
talking to me about an 11-millon-dollar deal as well. I’m just not sure
I can come up with that kind of money.
It’s an honor to be introduced by David Keene. His commitment to
conservative principles has been tested and proven, in many venues and
over many years. Some of you were here with Dave for the very first
meeting of CPAC in the 1970s. You’ve been involved long enough to know
that like every great cause in America, the conservative movement has
periods of success and moments of setback. And in 2008, we had more
than our share of disappointments. But we haven’t come to CPAC to dwell
on battles we’ve lost. We are here to get ready for the battles we’re
going to win.
As conservatives, we face this new year with resolve, but without
resentment. Our country has a new president, and he has our prayers and
best wishes. In the last eight years, we saw how a president’s
political adversaries could be consumed by anger, and even hatred. That
is not the spirit that brings us together. We want our country to
succeed, no matter who’s in power. We want America to be prosperous and
secure, regardless of who gets the credit. At our best, that has always
been the mark of the conservative movement – in good times and bad, the
interests of this great nation come first.
Right now the interests of America will depend in many ways on the
decisions of President Obama. Those choices are his to make, whether or
not we see eye to eye. We won’t be afraid to disagree with him when we
must. And we won’t be afraid to agree with him when we can. One thing
the President can know is that when he takes strong action in defense
of the United States, we will stand by him. And we will always support
the brave men and women of our nation’s military that he now
commands.
We make these commitments out of principle, and our principles don’t
depend on elections won or lost. Contrary to what you hear from some
commentators on the left, the 2008 elections did very little to settle
the most serious differences of opinion in American politics. Some of
those issues were hardly debated at all in the fall campaign. As
conservatives in opposition, we have a duty to press on …a duty to
state our case with confidence.
Some critics speak as if we need to redefine conservatism. I think that
misses the mark. America’s challenges are different from year to year,
but our defining principles remain the same. Conservatives don’t enter
each new political era trying to figure out what we believe. Facing new
and complex problems, we find the answers in principles that endure.
Ronald Reagan used to say that “the trouble with our liberal friends is
not that they are ignorant, but that what they know is wrong. ”
Conservatives don’t claim to know everything, but what we know is
right.
Conservatives believe in settling great questions the way the Founders
intended – especially where the stakes are the highest. Courts that
have undermined the fundamental right to life have shown an equal
disregard for the rights of property and the rights of religious
freedom. We’ve even seen them extend rights to terrorist combatants who
have killed Americans and who would like to kill many more.
In the way of judicial nominees, these next four years aren’t likely to
be encouraging. But we conservatives stand for causes that are too
important to allow unelected judges to force their own biases on an
unwilling nation. We may not always win at the polls, but we believe in
democracy …we respect the will of the people …and across this country,
we will not stand idly by as liberal judges try to re-write the
constitution and override democracy.
I’m often asked these days what Republicans and conservatives have to
do to recover. And I’ll bet my answer is the same as yours. Our first
concern isn’t a political recovery – it’s the recovery of our
country.
We‘re at one of those rare moments in history, when the biggest tests
come all at once. We don’t have the luxury of taking them on one by
one. We have to get a lot of things right, and all at the same time.
We’re in the second year of a major recession, and if we don’t make the
right choices, things could get worse. Americans have already lost some
12 trillion dollars in net worth. And the pool of our nation’s
investment capital has also shrunk by trillions of dollars.
The President has already moved to stop our economy’s downward spiral.
Parts of the stimulus will, in fact, do some good. But too much of the
bill was short-sighted and wasteful. Every single Republican in
Congress voted in favor of a better stimulus plan, one that focused on
creating jobs immediately. But Congressional Democrats couldn’t
restrain themselves from larding up their bill with tens of billions of
dollars for their political friends. Republicans wanted to stimulate
the economy, Democrats wanted to stimulate the government.
Conservatives in the House and Senate stood their ground and voted
no—and they were absolutely right.
So far, the Administration has been unclear on what it will do to
address the huge decline in the pool of risk and investment capital.
These losses will be felt in businesses that don’t start-up and grow,
and in jobs that don’t get created. To grow the pool of investment
capital, the last thing you’d do is to raise taxes on investment, as
the President has proposed. The surest, most obvious course is to rule
out higher taxes on investment. I would propose going one step further.
For all middle-class Americans, we ought to abolish the tax on
interest, dividends and capital gains.
This economic crisis has proven that government has an urgent
obligation to address some awful abuses we’ve seen in the financial
sector, particularly in housing finance. Free markets, properly
regulated and allowed to work as they should, have propelled America to
be the largest economy in the world. For years, Washington politicians
did nothing to prevent the abuses at Fannie and Freddie, and in some
cases they encouraged those abuses for political gain. Let’s be clear
on this point: conservatives favor clear, streamlined and up-to-date
regulations and laws that let the economy work, but we will vigorously
oppose those politicians who are poised to use their own failures as an
excuse to undermine the free enterprise system.
I know we didn’t all agree on TARP. I believe that it was necessary to
prevent a cascade of bank collapses. For free markets to work, there
has to be a currency and a functioning financial system. But we can
agree on this: TARP should not have been used to bail out GM, Chrysler
and the UAW. And this is personal for me, I want the U. S. auto
industry to succeed. But as some of us pointed out last November, that
can only happen if its excessive costs and burdens are restructured.
And concessions are going to be few and far between if bondholders and
unions already have your money when the negotiating begins. The right
answer for Detroit is this: Fix it first.
All of these measures are meant to confront the current economic peril.
Properly guided, Washington could in fact speed the recovery. So far,
some of the actions it has taken will help, and some will hurt. But we
can be certain that the American economy will recover. The invisible
hand of the market is more powerful than the lumbering machinery of
government. In the final analysis, we know that the private sector –
entrepreneurs and businesses large and small – will create the millions
of jobs our country needs.
Earlier this week, the President addressed not only the current
economy, but also his broader goals. I was pleased that he put
healthcare, education, and energy on the agenda. The direction we take
on these issues will profoundly shape the future of the nation. I’m
afraid I know where the liberal Democrats want to take us. And as they
try to pull us in the direction of government-dominated Europe, we’re
going to have to fight as never before to make sure that America stays
America.
President Obama was awfully vague about some of his plans, but I think
I heard him say that government is responsible for educating a child
from birth—from birth—to its first job. Universal pre-school and
universal college. And there were hints as well of universal healthcare
and a universal service corps. It all sounds very appealing, until you
realize that these plans mean universal government. That model has
never worked anywhere in the world. America is great because our
society is free and the power of government is limited by the
Constitution.
For the last several years, we’ve heard liberals moaning about the 700
billion dollars that have been spent over six years to win freedom in
Iraq. They have now spent more than that in 30 days. And with a
government almost 12 trillion dollars in debt, any unnecessary spending
puts at risk the creditworthiness of the United States. If the world
loses confidence in our currency, that could cause a run on the dollar,
or hyperinflation that would wipe out savings and devastate the Middle
Class. President Obama says he hopes to cut the deficit in half after
four years—does that mean a deficit in 2012 of 600 billion dollars? No
president should accept such a staggering deficit, much less hold it up
as a national goal. This is the time to pare back government spending.
It is not the time to fulfill every liberal dream and spend America
into catastrophe.
Congressional Democrats are gearing up to take over the health care
system. We need to advance a conservative plan – one based on free
choice, personal responsibility, and private medicine; one that doesn’t
add massive new federal spending. I like what I proposed in
Massachusetts when I was governor. And even though the final bill and
its implementation aren’t exactly the way I wanted, the plan is a good
model. Today, almost every Massachusetts citizen who had been uninsured
now has private, free-market coverage, and we didn’t have to raise
taxes or borrow money to make it happen. We may find even better ideas
in other states. But let’s make certain that conservative principles
are front and center. A big-government takeover of health care is the
next thing liberals are going to try, and it’s the last thing America
needs.
What America does need is a commitment to reforming entitlements.
I believe that Medicaid should be capped and put in the hands of the
states; Social Security benefits for high income citizens who are now
age 55 or younger, should grow with the consumer price index, not the
wage index; and Medicare should be reformed with a dose of free-market
reality. These and other reforms are essential, because if we stay on
the same road, the next generation could see tax rates 50 percent
higher even than ours – and that’s to pay the bills we’ve racked up for
ourselves. Passing on that kind of debt to our children is not only
fiscally irresponsible, it is morally wrong.
I was glad that the President said he favors charter schools. Did you
hear what sound came from the Democratic side of the chamber? Crickets.
I hope the President will join all of us to expand school choice,
reward better teachers with better pay, raise teacher standards in
academic subject-matters like math and science, and enable school
districts to remove teachers that don’t make the grade. It is high time
to put America’s kids first and leave the union bosses behind.
We and the President agree that America must act to become energy
independent. But his cap-and-trade proposal is exactly the wrong way to
go about it. It would tax American citizens and employers and send
businesses and jobs to high polluting and high emitting nations like
China. Any carbon plan has to be worldwide in scope: they don’t call it
America-warming, they call it global-warming.
Let’s also be the voice that defends the rights of workers – against
coercion and intimidation. The working people of this country should be
able to unionize the way their fathers and mothers did – by free choice
and secret ballot. The Democrats’ plan to take away those rights is an
insult to the dignity and common sense of working people. It would be
calamitous for the economy. I know that the Democrats want to pay back
the union bosses for all the money they gave them, but they must not do
it by selling out the American worker – and democracy.
America voted for change. America did not vote for a boat-load of new
government spending programs that would guarantee higher taxes and high
deficits as far as the eye can see and that would threaten our
currency, our economy, and our future. We must be the alternative
course. We can’t be that if all we say is no. Our plans must be clear,
compelling, and first to the table. Our plans must have at least one
common thread—they must make America stronger. Better education
strengthens our kids; better healthcare strengthens our citizens; and
bringing our budget into balance strengthens our economy and preserves
our future. Today, as much as ever, conservative principles are
absolutely essential to keeping America strong and prosperous and free.
With all that is happening here at home, there are some who have
forgotten that we are at war, that Iran and its jihadist surrogates are
killing our sons and daughters abroad, and hope to do it here. I am
pleased that our troops will be coming home from Iraq. But let there be
no confusion: it is in spite of Barack Obama’s stance on Iraq, not
because of it, that the troops are coming home in victory!
President Obama is barely a month into his term, and, of course, his
biggest decisions on national security are still ahead of him. His
administration has won the favor of liberal commentators by pledging
what it calls reform in the treatment of terrorist detainees. He’s also
promised to close down Guantanamo, without giving the slightest
indication of the next stop for the killers being held there now. That
decision, too, has received the predictable applause from certain law
professors and editorial boards.
But here’s the problem. That is the very kind of thinking that left
America vulnerable to the attacks of September 11th.
This is not a law enforcement problem. It is the gravest matter of
national security, with thousands if not millions of lives in the
balance. The jihadists are still at war with America. Our government
has no greater duty than a vigilant defense, and no greater cause than
victory for America and for freedom.
I had no objection when Barack Obama decided to give his first TV
interview to an Arabic broadcaster. But when he said that America in
the past has dictated to the world, he was misguided and naïve.
And the next time our president speaks to a foreign audience I hope he
will remember this basic fact of history: America is not a country that
dictates to other nations. We are the country that has freed millions
of people from the tyranny of dictators. Never in the history of a
world has a single country possessed such great power, and used it for
such good purpose across the world, as the United States of America.
I believe President Obama was also mistaken in backing away from our
commitment to missile defense. And if he calculated that Russia would
respond in kind by showing a little restraint and good will, he quickly
learned otherwise. All Russia did to return the favor was bribe
Kyrgyzstan to shut down our use of its airports, closing access we
needed for our troops serving in Afghanistan. Gestures that communicate
a lack of resolve only embolden America’s adversaries. With Iran
seeking nuclear weapons, with North Korea already nuclear and selling
its technology to the Syrians, it is essential that we construct a
missile defense, now.
A lot of you have the memory of coming to CPAC in its early days, when
America had challenges so big that many in the world – and even a few
in our own government – thought we were in decline. They doubted our
ability to compete economically, to face down the dangers of the era,
or even to defend our ideals. Today we’re hearing echoes of that era
once again, from those who speak of America as if our day has passed.
Some of these critics never cared much for our belief that America
occupies a special place …that there is work in the world that only we
can do …and that Americans have the heart and the courage to get it
done. But we know these things to be true. And to those who question
the character of our country, including the new attorney general, let
us remind them that America has never been, is not now, and will never
be a nation of cowards.
I don’t deny that America’s challenges are great, or that overcoming
them will require the best that we have to give. But I know as well
that times of difficulty always bring out the essential character of
our fellow citizens. When I was a boy, my dad used to say that the
pursuit of the difficult makes you strong. Well, the pursuit of the
difficult will make America strong. We welcome the challenge. It will
call on us, once again, to draw on the incredible resilience,
ingenuity, and faith of the free men and women of America.
We don’t get to choose the tests and trials ahead. But we’re
entirely free, you and I, to choose how we will meet those tests. We
will meet them as conservatives have done before. We will find strength
in each other, and answer our opponents with good will and honest
words. And we will go forward – confident in our beliefs, and certain
of victories to come. Thank you.
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