Secondary Thoughts on the Primary

I feel like I'm in a bag of mixed nuts with yesterday's outcome of the Utah Senate race. Logically, I should be satisfied with the Mike Lee win in the GOP Senate race--after all I voted for the man and felt comfortable with my vote.

I had planned to have my thoughts all neat and organized weeks before election day but instead found myself thinking, vetting, reading, and pondering on this decision. At one point in the process I was just about fed up enough to go write Jason Chaffetz' name down on the ballot and walk away. Instead, I looked at what Chaffetz had done in the race: he had made it clear he wasn't endorsing. I respected that decision a lot and began thinking about my own blog endorsements (the keen reader will notice some changes). In the end I decided I couldn't endorse either Lee or Bridgewater and even wondered if I should even say whom I was planning on voting for.

One nice consequence of not endorsing is that my mind remained unclouded so as to see the good and bad in both candidates. I saw many great patriots seem to become blinded to the bad in their own candidate. If you praised their candidate, you were a patriot. If you expressed any concern about their candidate you were ridiculed. I saw both the Bridgewater and Lee camps containing great and small modern-day patriots. I saw the sacrifices people were making to get what they deemed a great candidate elected to the Senate.

And then the election happened and Lee won by 2 points; I was secretly hoping it would be close although admittedly I thought Bridgewater would win. Post-election now follows with more ridicule by some of ridding of "blog trolls" and mocking patriots on the other side.

And yet I remain concerned, perhaps scared even. How will Lee (39) be as the youngest current Senator? Will he stick to his promises? Will he connect with the folks or be arrogant? I could ask the same questions were Bridgewater to be elected or anyone. The pro-Lee folks will tell you that you just don't know Lee well enough; OK, but if that's the case only God knows Mike Lee well enough. We don't have enough second chances left to get back to our Constitution for us to inadvertently send back the wrong person.

Bridgewater made the decision to vote for Lee easy for me by not responding to my email. I pretty much decided that when one candidate (Lee) would answer (yes, it took some prodding) and the other wouldn't or didn't, I wasn't interested in voting for a candidate who ignored me. I also became concerned that Bridgewater was more moderate in some of his views of wanting to do good government programs (Ex-Im Bank) rather than abolish them and cut wherever possible to downsize government and balance the government.

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't this sleeper Lee guy all along as I'm sure I'll be accused now that I've announced my vote. Lee ducked more than one debate, donated to Bennett's campaign, and particularly in the beginning came off arrogant. While I thought the "Lee Lobbying Lenses" (as I like to title it in my mind) for 1-800 Contacts without registering was interesting, it didn't seem to make me want to bail when he had talked with the guy in charge beforehand. Finally, now that Lee is the probable winner come November, I don't want to see his brother Tom be on the State Supreme Court. Too many Lees for me. Let's not tie up all that power in one family when there are others out there.

Bridgewater wasn't my guy this time around. He may or may not be my guy another time around depending on my choices. But I wouldn't dare send anyone to Washington these days without keeping the strictest of watch over them. So congratulations Bridgewater and Lee you should both be proud of your great campaigns and desires to restore honor back to our country. I think highly of both of you. But Mr. Lee I have a special caution for you now: don't expect me to be letting you off the hook just because I voted for you. I'm ready to throw you under the bus at the first sign of you throwing my Constitution under the bus as has been done too many times before by predecessors. You will serve me and my fellow citizens of the state of Utah and we will hold you fully accountable before God in a judgement day even when God allows justice not to prevail for a time on earth. Should you come home in 6 or 12 years having kept your promises of repealing Obamacare, raising the Social Security retirement age, balancing the budget, and restoring honor to our Constitution, then will you have earned more than my vote: you will earned have my praise for a job well done.