06 October 2009 // 09:14 am // Comments Closed
Fong campaign comes to Spencer
Read this story at the Spencer Daily Reporter
“It’s spin or accounting tricks,” Christian Fong said of the state budget.
“But it’s not common sense.”
The insurance executive from Cedar Rapids made his first campaign stop Monday in Spencer and touted himself as a social conservative and economist who pledged to shrink the size of state government by 5 percent in his first year as governor.
He’s seeking the GOP nomination to challenge Gov. Chet Culver, the presumed Democratic nominee. Fong said the governor is misguided in an attempt to borrow his way through a budget crisis.
“Iowans don’t take money from their kids to pay for things—for themselves—today,” he said. “Now, at the state government level, that’s called bonding to pay for a budget deficit.”
Fong said he would balance the budget and would veto any budget not in strict adherence to the 99 percent spending limitation law. He proposes a uniform state information technology system to ease communication between state agencies and wants to outsource ownership of the state’s fleet of vehicles.
“But it’s more than just balancing the budget. We have to get job creation going again,” he said.
The state and communities aren’t growing because Iowa’s core values of hard work, loyalty, faithfulness and neighborliness are being attacked, according to the candidate.
“I grew up in a family that didn’t have a lot,” he said. “I grew up on free and reduced lunch program, but because of the hard work of teachers, the community and neighbors, that allowed me to learn the value of hard work and the value of education.”
But, he said he sees access to the American dream slipping away under the weight of out-of-control government growth. He said state government no longer reflects the values of Iowans anymore.
The candidate is the son of an immigrant who escaped Communist China and married a Nebraska farm girl. The elder Fong worked two and sometimes three jobs during the farm crisis of the 80s.
The family grew up in Underwood near Council Bluffs. Fong went on to Creighton University and earned a master’s degree from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. He is an executive with AEGON USA and is president and CEO of Corridor Recovery, a nonprofit flood relief organization that coordinated recovery efforts after the floods of 2008.
His Spencer stops were part of a 17-city tour and he said the best solutions are emerging from communities, not from the political centers of Des Moines and Washington, D.C. He also said “TEA” parties and health care town forums are evidence that Iowans are going through a political awakening.
Fong spent 13 years in the private sector as a businessman, executive and community leader. He served on various boards and commissions, but “not in elected office,” he said.
“My resume doesn’t include running any level of government into the ground,” he told the 15 people who attended his campaign stop.
In another high priority, Fong said the issue of traditional marriage has to be addressed.
“Iowans deserve the opportunity to vote on a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman,” he said.
Fong joins a crowded field of Republicans who have either announced their candidacy or have made clear they are leaning toward seeking the GOP nomination, according to the Associated Press.
They include Reps. Christopher Rants of Sioux City and Rod Roberts of Carroll; and Sens. Jerry Behn of Boone and Paul McKinley of Chariton. Former four-term Republican Gov. Terry Branstad has said he’s considering a run.
Culver hasn’t made a formal announcement but has been aggressively raising money and assembling a campaign staff.
