Grading the Candidates -- Tim Bridgewater

Tim Bridgewater

The Economy and Government Spending – Mr. Bridgewater has a much longer treatise on this issue than Mike Lee has. He rails against the ills of government spending, Bob Bennett’s record, and the consequences of Congress spending too much. In the end he claims that he will vote no on spending bills in a majority of cases. He claims he will support spending for government agencies that he feels have a constitutional role.

Unfortunately, Mr. Bridgewater’s professional record is (at least in a small way) contradictory of his position. The SL-Trib exposed some inconsistencies related to his business dealings and his (and his clients) being beneficiaries of government earmarks and the very programs that Mr. Bridgewater rails against.

Honesty – A
Best Move for our Country – B
Realistic – D (I don’t believe for an instant that Tim Bridgewater will manage to vote no on a vast majority of appropriations bills, as the campaign site puts it “when I have cast 133 votes on appropriations bills, most of them will have been NO votes.”)
Believability – C (The revelations of his business dealings call his believability into question on this issue)

Average – C+

Afghanistan (and Iraq) – Mr. Bridgewater’s stated position on Iraq and Afghanistan is that he doesn’t support withdrawing from Afghanistan. He claims he believes we need to make sure that those countries understand that our commitment isn’t open ended, but that we cannot have a cut and run strategy (the idea of openly setting a deadline to be out of the US military commitments). He believes that discussions of withdraw need to be done behind closed doors because, he asserts, discussions of military withdraw might provide encouragement to enemy organizations – and that it would promote Iranian expansionism.

While I agree that we need to make sure the nations where our troops are deployed understand that our commitments are not open ended and that we don’t provide encouragement to the enemy, Mr. Bridgewater needs to answer the fundamental question of when do we need to finish these engagements and return our troops home. The Saddam regime has been gone for years – how long will it take for the Iraqi’s to take control of their nation? Mr. Bridgewater also fails to provide much insight into how he would suggest that Congress should avoid quagmires like that of Iraq and Afghanistan, and his opponent Mike Lee defeats him soundly on this point.

Honesty – C
Best Move for our Country – C
Realistic – A
Believability – C

Average – C+

Immigration – For starters, the Bridgewater campaign is still using the infamous and offensive “anchor baby” phrase to describe the Mexican-American babies born to illegal immigrants here in the United States. Strike one. However, the Bridgewater position on illegal immigration does get better.

Bridgewater supports controlling the border with physical barriers and additional Border Patrol enforcement. I agree with him on this point.

Unlike Mike Lee, Tim Bridgewater acknowledges that the immigration system is broken costing on average thousands of dollars to attain citizenship and several years. He would support a “massively comprehensive” (snarky reference to the campaign site) reformation of Immigration and Naturalization – this is crucial if we are to incentivize would-be immigrants to come here through proper channels.

Honesty – A
Best Move for our Country – A
Realistic – A
Believability – A

Average – A

Tax Reform – Mr. Bridgewater’s tax position is that if spending is controlled, than taxes will be kept low as well. The tax talking point is basically a reiteration of his earlier position on deficits and congressional spending. Again, if Mr. Bridgewater can be successful at slowing congressional spending and using restraint in voting for appropriations bills, than I believe this would be good for the country.

For consistency, I’m handing the exact same grade for this as his position for the economy and congressional spending.

Honesty – A
Best Move for our Country – B
Realistic – D
Believability – C

Average – C+

Education – Mr. Bridgewater advocates a number of suggestions for education. These suggestions include the following:

 Return more power to state and local governments
 Cutting Federal spending on early childhood education and higher education programs (or at least give states more authority over these programs funds)
 (Without saying vouchers) Vouchers for private schools and even home schools
 Expand innovative education systems like charter schools

I agree with Mr. Bridgewater on lowering the Federal impact on public education, however I doubt that vouchers (especially for home schooling) would be passable into law.

Honesty – A
Best Move for our Country – C
Realistic – D
Believability – A

Average – B-

Healthcare – In lieu of the 2000 page healthcare bill that recently was signed into law, Mr. Bridgewater suggests that we pass 4 bills:

1. Bill 1: Creating real competition & choice in the insurance market – The plan includes refundable tax credits for the purpose of paying private insurance premiums for lower income families, the nationwide insurance market proposed by Obama, health insurance pooling for small businesses, expansion of HSA’s.

2. Bill 2: Litigation reform – Bridgewater wants to make it more difficult to get large malpractice settlements.

3. Bill 3: Move Medicare and Medicaid to the States’ Control – Bridgewater believes that if Medicaid and Medicare were controlled more by the states, than these two programs would be more efficient and economical.

4. Bill 4: Investing in science & innovation – Government spending should focus on speeding medical innovations to the marketplace, and on making new and better innovations in medicine.

This position strikes me as a reiteration and parroting of many right-wing talking points after the Obama-care bill was passed on Christmas Eve. I appreciate that Mr. Bridgewater is supportive of the national insurance market suggested by Barack Obama, allowing small businesses to from health insurance pools, and forcing some sort of litigation reform (although we need to be careful about caps due to the devastating nature of so many malpractice caused injuries).

Honesty – A
Best Move for our Country – B
Realistic – C
Believability – A

Average – B+

Overall GPA 2.92 (B-)

Conclusion: Despite the distasteful use of the term “anchor baby” and the apparent contradictions between his business dealings and his rhetoric. I actually like a few of Mr. Bridgewater’s positions. I really appreciate that he seems to get the need to make immigration more attainable to would-be immigrants and that he doesn’t suggest that the Federal government mandate all estimated 20+ million illegal immigrants be deported before they can take steps to attain legitimate citizenship.

Unfortunately, there are enough negatives that keep me from believing that he is the change candidate that Utah voters are looking for.