First of all, let me be honest; I am a moderate conservative.  I am not a hard right my way or the highway type person. This is my first attempt at this so please bear with me and keep reading.  I sincerely hope at the end of this you will see a clear path forward.   I am what some of you would call Papa, or gramps, or old man, but guess what, that gives me a lot of perspective.  So when I tell you that this Presidential election is one for the record books, believe it.

What we have are two candidates that are as much opposite of each other that could be possible.  Diametrically opposed of each other.  Hillary Clinton, a former first lady, a former Senator, a former Secretary of State, a pure politician.  She is a Democrat.  Donald Trump, a businessman, real estate mogul, beauty pageant owner, TV show producer, a pure capitalist.  He is a Republican.

I realize that some of you are die hard Republicans and Democrats and that what I write here will not sway you, if that is the case then feel free to exit.  I am writing to those people who are undecided.  I am going to present what we are told from various media outlets in an unbiased look at what information we have to sort through to make our decision come November.  Do I believe everything I see, no; everything I read, no; everything I hear, no.  I try and filter out the bias, and one sided opinions to try and get at what I think the truth is in my own mind.   So hang on and I will share with you my thoughts.

Let’s start with Hillary.  She has been in the public light for over 30 years.  Well over half of that time in the shadow of her husband Bill.  I am not going to bring him into this.  I am also not going all the way back to Whitewater, too much “water” under the bridge for that, although I will say that it does begin a pattern.  I am going to limit this to decisions I believe she made herself.  I think this is most relevant.  My evaluation of her will not use what she might have been told to do by others

Benghazi: What a horrible tragedy for the people that we abandoned there for in my opinion, purely political reasons.  A horrible loss for the families involved.  I pray that they will someday get comfort.   The thing that disturbs me most about what Hillary did in this tragedy is when she told the loved ones of the fallen one account of what happened and her daughter Chelsea and others what really happened.   This is according to several media outlets and the family members of the fallen.  For whatever reason, Hillary made the decision at that time, to tell the family members what she did.  I believe the family member’s accounts as they had absolutely nothing to gain at the time. That says a lot to me.

Hillary’s e-mail:  Look, I will promise you that I am not a tech savvy guy.  I was not born in the electronic generation.  I can somewhat function in the cyber world, but barely.  This is why, in some respects, I understand why Hillary was where she was.  The issue I have is that she knew having a server outside of the government domain was wrong.  Why she did this, anyone could speculate, but it was wrong.  She was using this server to conduct official government business, some of it very secret, which I think in her own heart she knew was wrong.  Yet, she did it anyway.

The Clinton Foundation:   This is very troubling to me.  The lucrative amounts of money she was paid for speaking engagements, co-mingling with money Bill has received from his engagements and funds received from foreign governments all of this while she was Secretary of State.  Did her campaign benefit from this money?  Why did foreign governments contribute so much to this foundation?  In my mind she could have separated herself from all of this.  She knew a long time ago she had aspirations to run for the Presidency.  Again, she chose to involve herself in this foundation instead of completely removing herself from it.  Why do this?

Now let’s look at Donald Trump.  He is definitely not a politician.  He speaks his mind and often says a thing he shouldn’t which gives the press huge amounts of ammo to use against him.  Why does he do this?  Because he has always been able to.  He is a billionaire businessman who is used to having people listen and not critique everything he says.  Now he is in their sandbox and it is ripe with traps, and people that shift like a desert dune.  Truly treacherous..

IRS audit:  Donald is being audited.  I am sure for him this is a common occurrence.   However this time he will be scrutinized like never before.   I am sure his financials are very complex and for us, completely mindboggling.  I don’t know if any wrongdoings exist but it is a cloud.

Trump has said that he played the game with politicians in the past, contributing to various campaigns to help his business ventures get a favorable viewing.  I really don’t care for this, but it seems to be business as usual in today’s society and business climate.

So where am I in this race?  I think both Hillary and Donald are very intelligent people.  I think that Hillary truly believes that the laws that apply to you and me do not apply to her.  This is the reason for the bad choices she has made in her career.  She is purely political and she will say and do anything that she perceives will further her purpose.  The costs will not apply to her and will be quickly forgotten by an apathetic voter base or smothered by the liberal press.

Donald is arrogant, flamboyant, and speaks before he thinks often.  I believe he respects the law.  I also believe he needs to learn humility and learn to listen.  I also believe that Trump will preserve our democracy more so than Hillary.  The current Democratic Party is leaning very hard towards socialism.  Between these two, I must throw my support towards Donald Trump to be our next President.

Please exercise your hard earned right to vote in November.