Campaign Trail Results: Game #877116
Play The Campaign Trail
This Game:
- Year: 2012
- Player Candidate: Mitt Romney
- Running Mate: Paul Ryan
- Difficulty Level: Normal
- Winner Take All Mode?: Yes
- Game Played:
View overall results, or a specific state:
| Candidate | Electoral Votes | Popular Votes | Pop. Vote % |
|---|---|---|---|
| ---- Barack Obama | 512 | 80,249,686 | 61.81 |
| ---- Mitt Romney | 26 | 47,971,435 | 36.95 |
| ---- Gary Johnson | 0 | 1,229,660 | 0.95 |
| ---- Jill Stein | 0 | 376,667 | 0.29 |
Visits:
- Washington DC:12
Answers:
- A recent Supreme Court decision affirmed an Arizona law allowing officers to check suspected illegal immigrants for proof of immigration status. Do you think this law is a good idea?This is an unconscionable violation of civil rights and will certainly lead to racial profiling.
- In November 2011, Ohio voters rejected a law to limit collective bargaining power for public unions. Do public sector unions such as teachers' and police unions have too much bargaining power?Unions have been eviscerated by decades of outsourcing. Public unions are a necessary bulwark of the middle class and should have every right to bargain for fair wages and benefits.
- What is your position on gay marriage?Gay marriage should be protected at the federal level. The Defense of Marriage Act should be repealed.
- Do you support allowing the Bush Tax Cuts to expire for high-income households at the end of 2012?I support letting the cuts expire. It's time that wealthy Americans paid their fair share for the opportunities our society gives to them.
- In general, do you think bilingual education programs are a good idea?Absolutely. It it discriminatory not to allow American students to learn in their native languages.
- The Affordable Care Act (i.e. 'Obamacare') will cap annual premiums, require minimum coverage levels, and outlaw discrimination against people with pre-existing conditions. What do you think?I'm convinced that this program will work. This is a good compromise allowing private insurers to conduct business, while securing access to health insurance for more Americans. If anything, the increased transparency will reduce insurance costs.
- Do you have any comment to make on the performance of Ben Bernanke as Chairman of the Federal Reserve?Bernanke has performed admirably given the challenges he has faced.
- Should Angela Merkel be doing more to preserve to Euro as the European Union's common currency?What's happening now in Europe is criminal. The working class is being punished to fulfill the avarice of huge, multinational banks. Germany should be doing much more to assist Greece, Italy, and Spain before it is too late.
- Apple's use of cheap, Chinese labor via Foxconn has increased the visibility of labor conditions in that country. Do you think that China competes unfairly with the U.S. by denying basic rights to its workers?The U.S.-China relationship has destroyed middle class jobs for close to three decades. We need drastic changes including more protection for American manufacturing.
- The budget for the Department of Housing and Urban Development was cut by nearly $4 billion in 2012. Do you think subsidized housing for the poor is a good place to begin reducing the federal deficit?$4 billion barely puts a dent in the size of the deficit. If we made a serious attempt to cut the size of the military our savings would be vastly greater.
- What is your opinion on the Tea Party movement?A funny thing happened on January 20, 2009 -- millions of people who supported Bush's deficits suddenly flip-flopped into budget hawks. This group is obviously just a political front for the far right wing of the Republican Party.
- Would you advocate cutting Peace Corps funding to help address the deficit?This is a valuable component of our international presence. We should maintain the funding we have in place, which is miniscule in proportion to our overall budget.
- Should military spending be cut to help reduce the deficit? If so, by how much?How can Republicans talk about cutting the size of the federal government without supporting a dime of military cuts? In a post-Cold War environment, it makes absolutely no sense for us to spend what we do on defense. Military spending should be cut drastically.
- Without divulging a preference for any particular religious group, do you believe that America was founded as a Christian nation?Thomas Jefferson himself rebuked this notion in his writings. Now over two hundred years later, religious fanatics are trying to bring this idea back. This is part of a dangerous, long-term agenda to turn the U.S. into a sectarian state.
- Some theorists have suggested that the government create guaranteed jobs at the federal minimum wage, to help support the labor market. Is this something that you would consider?This is a terrible idea. Can't you just picture twenty million employees performing make-work jobs at miniscule wages?
- After episodes such as the 'flash crash' in 2010, would you support a small financial transactions tax, with the sole purpose being to target high-frequency trading systems?Automated high-frequency trading serves no purpose in our financial system. Such trading houses are parasitic in nature and a financial transactions tax on them is entirely appropriate.
- What do you think the next steps should be in regards to Medicare?We must do whatever it takes to preserve Medicare. This program is one of the most important functions of the federal government.
- Do FEMA insurance payouts encourage real estate developers to build in disaster prone areas?It would be inhumane to suggest that we shouldn't be giving payouts to people who lose everything in a natural disaster.
- During your tenure, Bain Capital laid off thousands of workers at various companies that it purchased. Are you proud of your work at that company?Joseph Schumpeter coined the term of "creative destruction". Society will never evolve if some people aren't relocated into more productive pursuits from time to time.
- The rhetoric from some Republicans towards immigrants from Mexico has been quite harsh. Can you distance yourself from such comments?I take a level-headed approach to this issue. It's unfortunate that certain people have decided to use inflammatory rhetoric. Those statements don't represent my views at all.
- What will be the overriding theme of your nomination speech at the Republican Convention?I will address the long-term danger that liberalism has to create an ossified, uncreative society. I will also emphasize the danger to our individual and collective rights that is inherent Obama's philosophy.
- What is your guiding foreign policy philosophy?Non-Intervention -- Most of our foreign troop deployments are relics of the Cold War. We need to stop occupying other nations and focus on fixing our problems here at home.
- It has now been four years since the financial crisis plunged this country into a steep recession. Do you attribute current economic conditions more to Obama or to Bush?This is mostly a result of Bush's failed policies. Regulatory failures allowed too many bad loans to make their way into the financial system. We will not repeat this mistake.
- Be perfectly honest. How do you like Barack Obama as a person?I don't particularly like Barack. It's hard to feel good about someone who promotes policies as misguided as his.
- In the most general terms, what will be your overall campaign strategy against Obama?I will emphasize the conservatism of my views and my governing philosophy. I will remind the American people that I am strong on defense and that I'm pro-life, pro-free market, pro-business, and deeply religious.