COMMENTARY: Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval isn’t living up to many Republican principles

I’m a lifelong Republican. My political career started at the age of three, when I handed out campaign literature for Barry Goldwater in my father’s arms. My life has been dedicated to electing Republicans ever since. I bleed GOP red.

I’ve built from scratch right here in Las Vegas one of the most successful conservative talk radio shows in America because my opinions resonate with Republicans, conservatives and common-sense independents all over this great city.

I credit the success of my radio show to my grandfather. He taught me the two keys to business success:

1) The customer is always right.

2) If the customer is wrong, refer back to No. 1.

The listeners of my radio show are my customers. My goal is to speak for them — the Silent Majority.

Brian Sandoval is the Republican governor of Nevada. His customers are that same Silent Majority. He has failed them badly. Our GOP governor couldn’t care less what his own customers think. In the business world, no CEO could afford to ignore the will of his own customers. He’d quickly go out of business.

Yes, there is room in the GOP tent for slight variation of views on many issues. But there are five bedrock principles that define Republicans, bind us together and can never be violated. If you don’t believe in these five, you’re not a Republican.

1) Taxes are too damn high. Taxes should be cut, not increased. My goal is always to give more money back to the people who earned it.

2) Spending by government is way too high. I am always for cutting spending and making government smaller.

3) Regulations hinder the creation of business and jobs. I’m always for making it easier for entrepreneurs and small businessmen and women to start and run their businesses. Regulations should be cut, not increased annually.

4) We need to lower welfare and entitlement spending. And everyone who collects any form of welfare must work.

5) I’m against Obamacare or any other form of government-run or government-intrusive health care. Government fails at almost everything it touches. It spends irresponsibly. It is incompetent and wasteful. How can giving government more control of health care make it better?

Our GOP governor fails when it comes to each of these measures. There is room for debate on most other issues. There is no room for debate on reducing taxes, reducing spending, reducing the size of government, reducing regulations, reducing entitlements and repealing Obamacare. If you don’t agree on those five principles, you need to change your party affiliation to Democrat.

Our GOP governor dramatically raised taxes, spending, entitlement spending, the size and scope of government and was the first Republican governor in the country to embrace the expansion of Obamacare. Today it’s clear he is unhappy and concerned about the potential repeal of Obamacare.

What?

Gov. Sandoval did one thing right. Yet he managed to screw that up, too. He helped pass the best school choice bill in America. Then he had a chance to permanently solidify it during the special legislative session last fall. But he was so concerned with ramming through another gigantic tax increase to pay for a football stadium that he ignored the one chance he had to pass the school choice bill.

Now with radical, ultra-liberal Democrats in charge of both houses, school choice is in deep trouble. If it does pass, it will be a poorly funded shell of its former self.

So, the real question is, was the governor ever really for it?

So, I give him a grade of F for every category above … and a D on school choice. Quite a record.

That’s why I call Brian Sandoval the worst Republican governor in America.

In my next column, I’ll tell you what the next GOP governor of Nevada must stand for.

Wayne Allyn Root (Wayne@ROOTforAmerica.com) is a best-selling author and host of “WAR Now: The Wayne Allyn Root Show” from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. daily at 790 Talk Now. His R-J column runs Thursday and Sunday.