As our country faces a record $482 billion deficit, gas prices that have soared above $4 per gallon, a war in Iraq that is costing over $12 billion a month and not making us any safer, and healthcare costs that have become prohibitively expensive for over 47 million Americans, we need to shake up Washington and demand new leadership rooted in accountability and fiscal responsibility.

I don’t have a typical politician’s story. My background is in business, not politics. When I was 22, my father died suddenly and I went to work for my father’s company to support my mother and family. For 30 years, I worked to create over 600 new jobs, made affordable healthcare available for my employees, balanced a budget, and took care of the bottom line. My ethical principles and my strident commitment to provide for my employees and family defined my success in business and at home. Our country needs leaders with different experience, proven results, and a pledged dedication to changing the special interest culture in Washington.

Bottom line: we can’t afford more business-as-usual from Washington.

My opponent, Jim Gerlach, was recently fined $120 thousand by the Federal Election Commission for misrepresenting campaign contributions. This constituted the largest penalty ever paid by a member from Pennsylvania. He has voted to weaken house ethics rules and allowed for lobbyists to wine and dine members in their official offices, and pay for their travel. He has accepted over $100 thousand in campaign contributions from Big Oil and has consistently voted to line their pockets with government subsidies.

Jim Gerlach is a career politician who breaks rules and weakens ethical standards. I am a businessman who believes that real change starts with demanding accountability from our leaders.

We need to hold our elected officials to the highest ethical standards. We need to go further than restricting the number of years that public officials have to “cool off” before lobbying Congress. We need to curtail the influence of special interests in governance by demanding a lifetime ban on ex-lawmakers becoming registered lobbyists. We need increased transparency including a demand for public access to lobbying reports and ethics records. I have publicly pledged not to accept any campaign contributions from the oil and gas industries because I believe that we need to cut off the flow of special interest money in politics.

Our country is facing tremendous challenges and it is time to elect new leadership that is truly independent and accountable to the American people.

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 7th, 2008 at 5:09 pm and is filed under Politics .