Hatch Wants to be Hired Without an Interview

In a letter to the editor recently published in the Deseret news, entitled “Defending Sen. Orrin Hatch,” Ron R. writes, "In the end, Hatch refuses to debate Liljenquist, which upsets me not at all." Why does it not upset him? There can only be one answer--he does not believe Hatch should have to apply for his job again as the Constitution requires.

Last time I checked, whenever an employee is up for a promotion (or raise or whatever), a performance review of some kind is done--usually by their boss.  In the case of a promotion, there is often competition and all the finalists must be interviewed so each can share why he/she feel they should chosen to fill the position.

The fact that Senator Hatch and so many of his supporters think he should get a job without an interview (i.e. debate) is telling.  What it tells me is that he and his supporters thinks he "deserves" the job—no interview, no competition.  In my view, only crown princes and dictators think they “deserve” a high position.  However, our Constitution says otherwise. It specifically establishes that Senators are “elected by the people.”

In this situation, the people of this state are Senator Hatch's boss.  He works for us.  And I think it would be very foolish of us not to vet all the candidates for this job, including looking at past accomplishments and failures, before making our decision.  And this process should include interviews—i.e. debates. Can you imagine what you would think if you invited someone to an interview and that person refused to come? No job interview? No job!

I have no interest in voting for someone who thinks he “deserves” anything.  We live in a Republican Democracy, not a small kingdom.

Friendship and Politics

At the recent Utah State GOP convention I ran into an old friend. He was all dressed up in Hatch regalia and I jokingly told him he was supporting the wrong guy.  (By that time I was committed to Dan Liljenquist.)  He said he was a Hatch supporter because Senator Hatch and his Dad had been friends for years.  I responded that I could still be friends with someone, but not vote for them.  I explained I could not support Orrin Hatch because I believe life begins at conception and he does not.  We exchanged a few more pleasantries and then went our separate ways. (It was great to see him!)

But that conversation got me thinking.  Why is it that so many politicians think you should vote for them (or endorse them) just because you are their friend?  The aforementioned conversation with my friend is only one example.  Another case in point is Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Senator Hatch.  Her political philosophy is much more in line with Mr. Liljenquist.  So why is she backing Hatch?  One rumor—it is because Hatch was nice to her during the last presidential election cycle.

While friendship is important in life, it is a purely social/emotional activity. While politics is often emotional, there are definite skills and abilities that are required for the enormous variety of jobs elected officials must do. If we focus solely on friendship when deciding who we should vote for, we miss several important elements that should be part of that decision. What is their stand on relevant issues? When faced with a contentious issue, what decisions will they make? What are their values? Voting records? Experience? Talents? Skill sets?

Asking someone to vote for you because you are their friend is exactly like saying they should hire you because you are their friend.  Again, what about values, skills, and abilities? What if the job requires medical skills and you were trained as a teacher?  Or the job requires right-brain work and your talents are more left-brain? Are you not just setting yourself up for failure by simply asking for a job out of friendship? Or, on the flip side, is someone else setting you up for failure by giving you a job when you do not have the skills and experience required to do actually do the job?

Think about it.

I believe one of the biggest “root cause” reasons we are seeing so many governmental failures right now is the constant engagement of feelings when what is actually needed are skill sets, principles, and rational thinking.  For example, if you hired a financial planner and this person kept losing your money year after year, how long would they work for you before you fired them and found a new financial manager? My guess is that for some people, one year of financial losses would be enough and for others, maybe he’d maybe get fired after two or three years of losses (for instance: it took three straight years of losing seasons before Gary Crowton was asked politely to leave as BYU’s head football coach).  


And yet, Senator Hatch has supported overspending in Washington for decades—I repeat—decades.  It is on the record that he directly voted for over $7,900,000,000,000 (that's trillion or 1 million billions) in additional debt (closer to $9 trillion if you include voice votes).  Do even more math and that is $25,000+ per person (not per taxpayer, per person). And, since only a fraction of our citizens in this country pay taxes (or "tax units" which can mean a couple) it gets worse--much worse. In 2011 there were 87.7 million "tax units." Divide that into $7.9 trillion and that comes to $90,000 per taxpayer.  Do you make enough money that your financial planner could overspend your budget by $90,000?  I know I don't! And this is only one issue of many.  


Why are so many people still willing to “hire” Hatch?  Because they like him. Because he is their friend.

Am I being too severe?  Ruthless? A lot of people may think so.  I guess everyone has different political philosophies. (It is one thing that makes life so interesting.) But, for me, I just cannot vote for someone just because they are my friend (anymore than I could hire someone who was just my friend; harsh, I know). 


And I think I am in good company. Jim Collins, in his bestseller Good to Great (2001), discovered that greatness requires rigor and that there was a difference between rigorous and ruthless. He found that, "To be rigorous means consistently applying exacting standards at all times and at all levels, especially in upper management."  I think that, as voters, evaluating skill sets, values, and voting records means we are applying "exacting standards" to our elected officials.  In my view, this is not ruthless--it is rigorous.  

In the workplace and in government, kindness and friendship do matter as does being treated with dignity and respect.  However, equal in the “productivity and growth” equation are skill sets and accountability. Think of it as tough love for the workplace. To co-opt a familiar saying, government cannot live on friendship alone.  Friendship cannot balance budgets or analyze spending or design Constitutional laws (and the list could go on).  Without skill sets and accountability, failure will follow.

We as an electorate must start doing a better job of 1) electing people who have the right skills and talents and 2) holding our elected officials accountable for proper (or improper) exercise of those skills and talents. In other words, we must get better at "consistently applying exacting standards at all times and at all levels."

So, with all due respect to my friends who continue to support Senator Orrin Hatch because he is their friend, I must, as respectfully as I can, disagree.  Yes, he is a good man who has done a lot of good things for Utah and this country.  But the record shows Hatch has also made many, many bad decisions—decisions that are now hurting this country—terribly.  His voting record on key issues matters.  His skills sets (or lack thereof) matters.  His willingness (or unwillingness) to be held accountable for his actions matters. And despite all the good he has done, he needs to be held accountable for the expensive, life-altering mistakes he has made.

Thank goodness that this year Republicans in Utah have a choice.  We can go to the polls on June 26 and support someone who is good and kind and might someday be a personal friend.  But, he also has the values, experience, and the skills needed to begin reversing the damage career Washington politicians have been inflicting on this country for over thirty years.  That man is Dan Liljenquist. It's Time.

Why Senator Hatch No Longer Represents Me

Retire Hatch. That was the mantra Utahns heard from FreedomWorks several weeks ago just before the Utah Caucuses. I am not a donor of FreedomWorks and I am not a leader in any of the major parties.  I like to think of myself as just an average Utah conservative.  That said, the FreedomWorks statistics intrigued me. Did Senator Orrin Hatch really vote to raise the debt ceiling 16 times and did those raises really amount to $7.5 trillion? If it was true, then this added one more reason to my belief that Hatch no longer represents me.

I have been an audit and compliance professional for 12 years and we have a saying in that industry--“trust but verify.” So, as a private citizen, I decided to do my own homework on FreedomWorks’ assertions.  

What did I learn? I learned that, while all data is subject to some interpretation, for several years Hatch voted consistently to the raise the debt ceiling. Using information from the Congressional Research staff and the congressional record itself, going back to 1978, the year after Hatch went into office, the record shows that Hatch voted “Yes” or via “Unanimous Consent” to raise the debt ceiling 20 times for a total of $7.9 trillion dollars.  If you include “Voice Votes,” that total rises to 37 times and $8.8 trillion. In all, federal debt has risen over $14 trillion since Hatch has been in office (and it is still rising).

Frankly, I was stunned. $14 trillion? A little more math shows this is the equivalent of Senator Hatch handing a bill for $45,000 to every man, woman, and child in the state of Utah (that is $224,000 for a family of 5).  And that bill is just for debt—it does not include the money required for ongoing expenditures. Where is the country going to get that kind of money? Certainly, even “the rich” cannot help pay for that kind of debt. Where was the “conservative” Senator Hatch when all of this was going on? He was voting “yes.”

The bottom line is that FreedomWorks pretty much got this statistic right. Wow.

However, as I mentioned earlier, this is just one more reason why I believe that Hatch no longer represents me.  My disillusionment with the Senator’s voting record actually started back in the year 2000 when, during that re-election year, Hatch was touting his experience on the Judiciary committee. It did not take a legal scholar to recognize that this so-called “power” was not being used to advance conservatism.  Hatch was not opposing Clinton appointees nor was he pressuring the administration for more conservative judges. In truth, he was actually approving liberal appointments.  What I did not know then, but know now is that Hatch not only voted to seat Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsberg--two of the most liberal judges on the Supreme Court--he is proud of the fact his suggested them to President Clinton.

Then, in mid-2001, came the embryonic stem-cell debate. I am unashamed to say that I believe life begins at conception and I believe a majority of Utahns hold this belief. We can quote one of our beloved leaders, a renowned medical doctor, as saying, “Life begins when two germ cells unite to become one cell … A continuum of growth results in a new human being. The onset of life is not a debatable issue, but a fact of science.”[1] What did Senator Hatch do with that belief? He shunned it and became one of only a handful of Republican Senators to join a large number of Democrats in urging President Bush to reverse the ban on embryo destruction and allow scientists to use human embryos for research. Thank goodness President Bush held his ground on life and upheld the ban. What is not well-known is that when Barak Obama became President, the ban was lifted and embryos are now being destroyed in the name of science. Senator Orrin Hatch is officially on the same page as President Barak Obama on this issue.

About 10 years ago a columnist at the Deseret News wrote, “it's time to quit calling Hatch a conservative. He's a moderate on social issues — and him siding with liberals [should no longer be a surprise].”[2] Do Utah conservatives honestly want to give Senator Hatch six more years as a lame-duck senator during which time he could do what he pleases? Be as liberal as he wants with no checks on how he could vote? I think not.  In my view, it is time to look at conservative alternatives. Thank goodness this election year we, the average conservative voters of Utah, have a choice and if we choose, we can elect Dan Liljenquist and "Retire Hatch."

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[1] Elder Russell M. Nelson, April 1985 General Conference, “Reverence for Life” and October 2008 Liahona, “Abortion: An Assault on the Defenseless.”

[2] Lee Davidson, Deseret News, May 8, 2002.

A David Versus Goliath GOP Primary

David versus Goliath is a common story. It is the tale of someone weak taking on someone who is large and powerful.  From the outset, the assumption is that the big guy will clobber the small one.


This year’s Utah GOP primary is truly a David versus Goliath narrative—Dan Liljenquist’s $770,000 versus Orrin Hatch’s $9.2 million.  For us “Davids”—average Utahns who would like to see Mr. Liljenquist become the next GOP US Senate nominee in Utah—those numbers alone are enough to make our almost penniless task seem hopeless. 

But is it truly hopeless?  Let’s look at a couple of circumstances.  First, Mr. Hatch took two distinct advantages with him when he went into the GOP convention this past April.  Number one, he spent $5.5 million wooing delegates. Number two, he used his substantial influence and knowledge of the Utah caucus system to pack the delegate count in his favor. Did either of these strategies work? No. After two ballots he failed to reach the magic 60% he needed to win the nomination outright. Some would say this was miracle number one.

When looked at a little more closely, this “non-knockout” is significant for a couple of reasons.  First, it showed that not all Utahns could be bought.  In Round 1 of the voting Senator Hatch received 2243 votes. Divide that into $5.5 million and each of these votes “cost” him about $2,500.  While Mr. Liljenquist’s votes only “cost” a fraction of that at about $225/vote.  Any good businessman would take note of such a differential. The “cost savings” on the Liljenquist side is dramatic.

Next, in the second round Hatch only picked up 70 additional votes, about a 3% increase, while Mr. Liljenquist picked up 487, or a whopping 44% increase.  Again, a businessman would notice there is something special going on with Liljenquist.

Why the dramatic differences in cost and vote counts?

Here are a few of my theories why these disparities occurred.  First, I believe message mattered more than money.  No matter how much he spent, Hatch could not defeat the rising anti-incumbent, pro-conservative, pro-accountability message.

Second, people are finally starting to wake up and see Mr. Hatch’s record for what it is.  For years he slid by on personality and name recognition and the citizens of this state listened.  All the while he was supporting bailouts, rising debt, and earmarks such as “bridges to nowhere.” He was also failing to push for conservative justices and protect human life at its very beginnings.  While some of us have known these facts for years, finally the serious problems in Washington are forcing the voting public to wake up with regards to Hatch’s actual record and to, finally, see that he has contributed significantly to what is now a national crisis.

Third, principles are (finally!) starting to matter more than people. Despite all the loyal fans of Hatch that were present at that the convention with their $2,500 worth of hats and scarves and shirts, principle won the day.  Hatch’s voting record was obviously an issue.  However, that was not enough.  Being “against” someone is not as powerful as being “for” someone else.  On April 21, Mr. Liljenquist stood before thousands of delegates and informed citizens and made an excellent case for his enthusiasm and leadership. He spoke passionately about principles such as fiscal responsibly, corporate turnarounds, conservative values, and Utah statesmen (who live here) representing Utah, not career Washington politicians (who live there).

The results? On April 21, $5.5 million dollars could not deliver a knockout punch in Hatch’s favor while about $250,000 gave the citizens of Utah a real choice. This was because it does not matter how much you spend on your message, what matters most is the message itself.

Looking ahead things may still seem hopeless for us Davids. Staring $9.2 million in the face is not an easy task. However, there is hope. In fact, Utahns have the chance to do something very special over the next four weeks. We have the chance to show that principles are stronger than tradition, politics, and personality, and that message really does matter more than money.  We have the chance to show Washington that our votes cannot be bought—that we are as smart or smarter than they are.  We can show Washington that voting records matter more than name recognition. We can show Washington that grass roots are more powerful than multi-million dollar commercials.

What we sometimes forget when referring to the story of David and Goliath is this—David won.  On June 26, Dan Liljenquiest can be the David of this story. Together, he and his supporters (us!) can tell the Goliath, Senator Hatch and his multi-million dollar donors, “that right makes might” (thank you Abraham Lincoln). All of us can rise up and say, “Senator Hatch, we appreciate your years of service, but it is time to come home.”

We can win this thing. And when we win, Utah wins, too.