I just got done voting in the primaries here in Ohio, and let me tell you it went without fail that when I told the people my party registration, I got the gasp of surprise then the sigh of disappointment from one of the election workers.  This is the second time that this has happened to me, once in NJ and again out here in Ohio.

Let me elaborate further, I live in a majority African-American suburban neighborhood in the Cincinnati-Metropolitan area, and I myself am 1/2 African American, 1/4 German, and 1/4 Polish, so obviously I should have asked for a Democrat primary form right?  Wrong, I broke the trend I guess I guess and asked for the Republican primary ballot.

Now in the Ohio Primaries for the Republican side, there were a lot of boxes that were single candidates (Rob Portman for Senator, Steve Chabot for the OH-01 House of Representatives seat, however I did take an interesting delight in their little surprise, but at some point where I am certain I won’t have police locking me up I will explain my rationale to them just like I intend to explain it here.

I grew up in the 80′s where I saw a great president in Ronald Reagan pretty much win the Cold War and ensure at the time that I would never be a victim of a nuclear holocaust at the hands of the Soviet Union.  By the time I was 18 the first real election I could be a part of was the Clinton/Bush/Perot election.  As I was watching Clinton, Bush, and Perot do their thing, I remember myself telling my friends, that I could see the strings through the TV screen and was very cynical of both Clinton and Bush, and I went ahead in my Freshman year and voted for Ross Perot.  Sometimes I do regret that decision but Bush number 1 did not really instill a confidence in me, and Clinton I could see was a scumbag from jump street.

As my college years went on, I was exposed to a good amount of liberalism when I took a class that was outside of my major (I was a Economics and Business Major), but again this didn’t truly make sense to me, but there was really no other alternative viewpoint or example of how conservatism worked, until I stepped into my Corporate Finance class.  Where the professor I had, (who was also the guy that wrote the book), started off the first couple of weeks talking about this thing called Libertarianism.  It was weird but for some reason it made sense to me.  As I listened to him more, I started thinking about the role of government and how it related to African-Americans and saw that the solution was exactly what this guy was saying, get the government out of the way, and anybody in general, and African-Americans in particular could thrive.  Why should I trust a government that turned a blind eye to years of African-Americans being treated like 2nd class citizens in the South, the subterranean racism that was prevalent in the North with lovely practices like redlining and having real estate agents sell a house to a African-American family then tell all the other white families how their property values are going to go down because of the family moving into the neighborhood, and those things were only addressed when the people in government found it politically favorable to address these issues.  Sorry, I don’t trust in the kindness of the heart of LBJ, when he is known to have said something along the line of if we give the n_______s the vote and welfare they will vote for us forever.  So it only fell in line to have a political philosophy that limited the governments ability to have any power beyond what is delegated in the Constitution over me.  So how does that translate into being more apt to support the GOP over Dems?

In listening to Dems I always heard about the government doing this and that but we will let you do anything socially you want, and knew that was not the answer, the GOP at least talked about and addressed limiting government’s reach into my pocketbook, if not in my social affairs, and I made the decision that the only true freedom is economic freedom, and social freedom blooms from that. hence my support for the GOP.

I guess what was surprising then disappointing to that election workers eyes was that I don’t buy into the belief that the red elephant = racist white guy, I also see the conditions of the uptown area of Cincinnati, and see what Democrat control has wrought throughout the years, and personally don’t want any part of it.

My mother once told me that insanity is repeating the same thing expecting different results, well in my mind being an African-American, and voting for folks who believe in government control, and having the same crime ridden, no advancement, and little opportunity is insane to me, I would rather attempt a different route.