Today, Americans all over the country face a choice between one candidate who embodies the Washington, D.C. status quo and another who represents a new way of doing business.
They face a choice between one candidate who proposes outdated policies and seems to only look backwards for guidance and another who proposes substantive policy reforms that will help modernize our economy for the 21st century.

They face a choice between old and tired and hope and change.

Sounds a lot like 2008, right?

Except this time around, the roles are reversed.

Barack Obama's campaign slogan may be "Forward," but when it comes to the most consequential issues facing our country, the president is stuck in the present at best and stuck in the past at worst.
On the other hand, the Republican ticket of Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan has proposed serious, substantive reforms that will adapt our public policy to the new realities that our nation faces as we move into the future.

A look at three of the most important issues in this election will illustrate our country's choice.
First, let's take a look at health care. In 2,700 pages of legislative language, the president's health care reform law does next to nothing to address any of the underlying causes of skyrocketing health care costs. It leaves our distorted health care tax incentives in place and makes no structural changes to Medicare or Medicaid. Instead it expands coverage by creating costly new entitlements and by pushing millions of people into the expensive and low-quality Medicaid program.
In contrast, Romney and Ryan have proposed real health care reform. They will end the market distortions caused by the uneven tax treatment of individually purchased insurance. This will make insurance more portable, as individuals will no longer be locked into jobs for fear of losing coverage, and more affordable, as a patient-centered marketplace begins to bend the cost curve.
Most importantly, Mitt Romney is the only candidate in this race who has proposed a serious plan to reform Medicare and Medicaid.

His reforms will not only save us from our looming debt crisis, but will also make health care more affordable by creating a real market for health insurance and health care in which choice and competition will keep costs low and quality high.

Next, education. The president has admirably supported charter schools and higher educational standards, but on the whole, he has failed to bring about the kind of education reform our country needs to prepare our children for employment in an increasingly competitive, knowledge-based global economy. He has ended funding for the successful D.C. Opportunity scholarship program. His Race to the Top program has been a bust. He promises to increase the number of teachers, but has few plans that would actually increase teacher quality.

Not only did Governor Romney help make Massachusetts schools the best in the nation, but he also has real plans to help improve our schools nationally.

His plan will encourage states to improve teaching quality by ending teacher tenure and instituting merit pay. He will make sure that federal education dollars follow children to the school of their parents' choice and not to political interests.

Finally, taxes. It is on this issue where President Obama most openly pines for the past. Instead of fundamental tax reform, he simply proposes marginal tax rates on those making over $250,000 a year (or as he calls them, "millionaires and billionaires) back to Clinton-era levels (39.6 percent). In the name of "fairness", he also proposes raising taxes on capital investment, discouraging the very activity that keeps the engine of the economy running.

This kind of simplistic thinking won't do in the 21st century. Europe is no longer recovering from a world war. The United States faces serious competition in a global economy from developing countries like China and India. If we are to compete in this new economy, we need a tax code that is simpler, flatter and more competitive.  

Mitt Romney has proposed lowering our corporate tax rate (currently among the highest rates in the industrialized world) to 25 percent.  This will finally allow America to compete on a level playing field with other countries and encourage corporations to come to and stay in the United States. He will also lower income tax rates by 20 percent across the board, encouraging the work, saving and investment that keep our economy growing.

Importantly, Romney wouldn't simply slash tax rates. He would eliminate many of the tax loopholes and deductions that serve to benefit the wealthy and well-connected. These tax expenditures number well into the thousands, cost over $1 trillion a year and grossly distort economic incentives. Ending them will help give our tax system the sanity that we need it to have if we are to compete with the rest of the world.

Mitt Romney is far from a perfect candidate. My own qualms with him include his opposition to marriage equality as well as his failure to take the issue of climate change seriously. But no candidate is perfect.

It's been said countless times, but this really is a choice election. Will we face our biggest challenges or pretend they don't exist? Will we modernize our economy or stick with an outdated economic order? Will we move forward or backward?

I believe we are strong enough to face our fiscal challenges. I believe our economy is strong enough to adapt to a new century. I want to move forward. That's why I voted for Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. And that's why we should all hope they emerge victorious tonight.