Interview with John Cox on Running for President
By Nathan Tabor (08/19/06)
This is a general interview.
Q: Why are you running for president?
A: I have looking at this for the last couple of years; solidifying my thoughts around the time Congress passed the Medicare expansion. I had watched as bill after bill expanding government and increasing spending was passed by Congress and signed by the President. I saw that something had to be done to return the Republican Party to its roots in Ronald Reagan’s vision of limited government. I saw the potential candidates posturing themselves and felt that there wasn’t one who would legitimately be able to claim that they would go to Washington with a mission to restore fiscal discipline, since they weren’t now doing it themselves.
Q: Do you think you can win the Republican nomination?
A: I think the country is ready for an outsider after its experience with the career politicians of recent years. I really do believe that the public has grown weary of career politicians, seeing them as responsible for the corruption, excessive partisanship and failure of policy in recent years. I am an outsider, but with extensive experience in the education and charitable world. I have also achieved much in the private sector, rising from my start in a housing project on the South Side of Chicago to running five successful businesses with assets of $100 million. That is the American Dream and an example for all young people born in less than privileged surroundings.
Q: Why should someone vote for you over other possible Republican candidates?
A: As I have noted, I am running for President to get something done, not advance up the political ladder, which is what I feel other candidates are mainly doing. I have a mission: I want to change what this country does. I want to solve problems, not create a political dynasty. I want to make a difference, not get a job or a nice pension. I already have a job and a nice pension. I think this country needs to take a different direction away from politics for profit towards solving problems with the free market, capitalism and competition. Education, health care, economic growth all benefit from free markets and competition, not big government. That is what I want to bring to the Presidency. Real leadership, real statesmanship Ânot career politicians. We need a real change in this country and I am going to make this the biggest issue in my campaign.
Q: What do you consider to be the number one issue facing America today?
A: There are many challenges facing our nation and my proposed solutions are pretty extensive so the best thing to do is refer your readers to my new book, Politics, Inc.: Principles, Not Profit; why we need statesmen, not career politicians for the long answers. However, to summarize the most urgent issues I am emphasizing in this campaign, I believe our biggest problems involve the War on Terror, encouraging economic growth in order to pay our debts and meet our obligations to our elderly, and preserving our values. The War on Terror is so obvious as our most important challenge; indeed, protecting Americans is the primary job of the President. We need to maintain our military superiority and use it and our economic strength to spread democracy around the globe and particularly in those regions with the economic resources to constitute a threat to us. This doesn’t mean we invade every nation that threatens us or is ruled by a dictator; what it does mean is that we will use our military and economic strength to isolate those regimes with the resources to effectively threaten us and send a message to their people that we support trade, economic liberalization and peaceful co-existence. We will first and foremost use diplomacy but we will also use our economic strength and the strength of our ideas to support pro-democracy non-violent forces within those countries. Lastly, we will use military efforts only if all else fails, but we will not be so foolish as to totally rule out that option.
Economic growth is key to providing opportunity to our own citizens while furnishing the base resources to fulfill the obligations we have made to our elderly. Growth will only come with investment and we need a tax system that encourages, not punishes, investment. A national sales tax should be enacted to completely replace the current insanely complex income tax. We could end the IRS, reach the underground economy, stop the corruption in Washington that spreads around money to purchase tax breaks and save the $250 billion we spend complying with this complex income tax. At the same time, we have to end the reign of the career politicians, who run up our spending and our debt by using taxpayer funding to ensure their re-election.
Q: Who do you think will become the Democratic candidate?
A: I am not sure, nor do I care. What is most likely is that it will be a career politician who has no idea of what it takes to create jobs or move the economy. It will likely be someone who believes that appeasement and withdrawal is a way to run foreign policy, which the American people do not agree with  the media might  but the American people do not. They want security and safety. The Democrat nominee will be someone who believes that government is the answer to the problems we face; I believe that big government is the problem  unfortunately many of the people who will contest for the Republican nomination appear to more agree with the Democrats  that is why I am running.
Q: If you lose the Republican nomination, would you run as an independent or third party candidate?
A: Short answer: No. Ross Perot gave us eight years of Bill Clinton. I won't do that to the country. I will not run as an independent if it would mean giving the election to a Democrat like Clinton  possibly Hillary in this case. I do not believe the country can stand it this time.
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