Issue Position: Ends, Means, Consequences

Issue Position

On these and other perennial issues, most differences concern only how to achieve a shared objective. The challenge to which I devote my energies on any major issue, therefore, is how to balance the ethical relationship among ends, means, and consequences.

For example, there is broad consensus that everyone should have access to healthcare. But, what are the best means of achieving this good end? Should government or the private sector be the principal insurer? In either case, what would be the consequences for taxpayers, for businesses, for doctors and nurses, for hospital systems and patients? And, would individual liberty be enhanced--or diminished?

It is because the means and consequences matter as much as the ends or objectives of public policy that I embrace principles of the Republican Party. While independency is possible at the local level, to be effective in Richmond every legislator must declare an allegiance. For example, though there are two Independents in the House of Delegates, both are members of the Republican Caucus. Each represents a traditional, rural district. (One of them is my seatmate.)

Our system of government is characterized by faction and friction--exactly as the Founders intended. Within these necessary constraints, it has I believe been the Republicans in the House--including my fellow neighboring delegates Sam Nixon, Kirk Cox, Manoli Loupassi, Watkins Abbitt, Bill Janis, and Tommy Wright--who have protected us against too much taxation and too much governmental spending at any level. And also, I might add, against too-intrusive a state government.

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