The Black Republican

My parents were very adamant about voting. They voted in nearly every election possible (as far as I remember), but my mom was especially quirky. She would vote but saw it as her constitutional right to not tell anyone who she voted for. My oldest brother is an entrepreneur. He's owned more businesses than I've had jobs. My next to oldest brother and younger brother are both redneck, gun-owning, ex-Marines who spent their careers in the air wing. All three of them are Bush-hating liberals. Go figure. My great-grandfather was mayor of my home town. However, given that he died in 1973, that had little to do with me becoming conservative.

The area I grew up in is reasonably conservative. OK, it was white central. In my high school of 1200 students, only 6 were black and 1 was Asian. Being that white doesn't make it conservative, but that it was all middle to upper middle class blue collar families pretty much does. In fact, it has been red more often than not since at least 2000. I was surrounded by rednecks and other upper middle class people for most of my life. My brothers, cousins, and uncles all went hunting nearly every fall. I was even invited to go duck hunting by a student when I was student teaching. Thus, my love and respect for firearms. Especially rifles and shotguns.

Looking back, I don't believe that I perceived much of a leftwing bias by my teachers in high school. This is with the exception of my economics teacher who used to tauntingly sing "If you liked Nixon, then you'll love Reagan." One very vivid memory, however, came when he was called away from the class and my U.S. History teacher took over briefly and said "You notice how he sings that song? Ask him who he voted for in '88. And then ask him about his Rolex." During my 'sophomore' year in college, my roommate was a HUGE Rush Limbaugh fan. In fact, it was during that year that Rush was on TV. Remember watching that? We TAPED it. That was my first real revelation that I was, in fact, conservative and not a democrat as I was registered.

My view on abortion is probably the most odd. When my mother got pregnant with me, she was advised to have me aborted because of the complications she had with the previous delivery. She, as I recall, had 4 miniature heart attacks during that delivery. It was considered, at the time, to be very risky for her to deliver me. However, she chose to go forward with it, trusting in God. So here I am. I don't believe that abortion is a constitutional right, but I do believe that there are medically necessary times for it. It is not birth control.

I think that 2 things have most influenced me to be conservative. My religion and my wife. Even though my maternal grandparents are devoutly Lutheran, they really had little to do with the direction that my religious up-bringing went. Gas prices in the 70's forced us to start walking to a Methodist church. Creepy. However, when I realized that organizations like the ACLU are against Christianity and that liberals are more against Christianity than conservatives, the choice there was very clear. Many times, I have set down how my life is under the direction of God, but that's a topic for another post.

For me, I see the Republican party as the party that is for freedom, for national security, and for people like my family and me. I'm proud to be a conservative. I'm proud to be an American.