The American Spectator

Exclusive to the American Spectator, I offer you the first look at Congressman (and Vice Presidential nominee) Paul Ryan’s new ad for his reelection race to his congressional seat, representing Wisconsin’s 1st District.

In the ad, entitled “Right Solutions,” Rep. Ryan explains that high corporate taxes, burdensome regulations, and government control of the economy are the enemies of job creation in America.

Ryan is likely to cruise to easy victory in his congressional race, though it is not in his nature either as a competitor or experienced politician to take anything for granted.

It is vintage Paul Ryan: giving straight-forward honest answers to the most important political and economic questions of our day. It is the second in a series of ads that the Ryan for Congress campaign will be rolling out before the election, each of which will have a similar approach.

Through his “listening sessions” Ryan has a lot of practice speaking hard truths, including about entitlement reform, to his majority-Democrat district and still winning reelection by wide margins.

It is both refreshing and frustrating to see Paul Ryan in action: Refreshing because Ryan is the future of the Republican Party. Or at least he’d better be if the GOP wants to remain (or perhaps to become) effective and relevant. It is frustrating because Mitt Romney can’t seem to grasp the Ryan magic, and voters tend to put little emphasis on the running mate in their voting decisions.

In this campaign, I do believe that the Republican base will in fact put substantial weight on Ryan, not just because he is a tremendous candidate, but also because the selection of Ryan was perhaps the only (intentional) bold move by Mitt Romney of the campaign. But when it comes to the critical independent voters, Mitt Romney will need to be much more Ryan-like to garner a winning margin in the most imporant election of my lifetime. Whether he is capable of it, I remain unconvinced — but not despondent.

Romney is in hot water for talking about the many Americans who pay no tax, arguing that those people are unreachable to him as voters. But Ryan has proven he can win over Democrats, and Romney should not concede them either. Just another lesson Romney can learn from his running mate.

I admit it: I’ve known Paul Ryan for a long time and contributed to his very first campaign for Congress (and again since then.) We are not close drinking buddies, but in a way I consider him a friend. More importantly, he and I both have young children and I know that he has his kids — and therefore my kids and yours — in the forefront of his thinking when it comes to his policies and his principles.

I stipulate, anticipating certain holier-than-thou, happy-to-never-be-satisfied critics that Paul Ryan’s voting record in Congress is not without its warts. Nevertheless, I insist that this man more than any other individual in Congress has been willing to grasp the feared third rail of American politics, entitlement reform, and show that it is an issue which not only can be dealt with, but must be dealt with. That political impact and courage alone earns him my ongoing gratitude, and should earn him yours as well. (And he’ll always be a bit of a hero for how he took Barack Obama to the woodshed in sham debates set up by the administration regarding Obamacare. The look on Obama’s face was priceless.)

While Ryan won’t take his race for Congress for granted, I hope he takes some time off that particular campaign trail to sit down with Mitt Romney and try to share a little of that Ryan magic (even if he has to listen to Mitt’s music while he’s doing so.)

Paul Ryan will within the next decade be President of the United States. Until then, he is one of the most important and effective champions of economic rationality in the nation. I only hope that when January rolls around, he’ll be carrying out that role by being the key economic policy player in a new Romney/Ryan administration.