[Vision2020] God Strikes Again

[Art Deco]

     <http://www.spokesman.com/> April 20, 2012
Local woman seeks nation’s highest office Talk show host Roth vies to be
Constitution Party’s presidential candidate
Jim Camden <http://www.spokesman.com/staff/jim-camden/>
The Spokesman-Review

Laurie Roth speaks in 2009 at the first major tea party rally in Spokane.

Laurie Roth, a syndicated radio talk show host who broadcasts from Spokane
County, is trying to parlay her strong conservatism, an unusual tax plan
and the story of her near-death experience into a long-shot bid for
the presidency.

*The self-described Annie Oakley of the Airwaves says she was called by God
*about a year ago to make the campaign journey from her double-wide trailer
in Elk, Wash., to the White House and turn the nation around.

“I am the comeback kid. I am the Seabiscuit story,” said Roth, a
51-year-old mother of two. “America is road kill, and so was I.”

On Saturday she’ll find out if the Constitution Party, one of the nation’s
largest third-party organizations, will put her atop their ticket in the
fall election. She’s one of three main candidates – along with Virgil
Goode, a former Republican congressman from Virginia, and Robby Wells, a
former college football coach – seeking the conservative political party
nomination at its national convention in Nashville.

She’s campaigning on a shoestring – she relied on donations to attend that
party’s debate in Michigan two weeks ago and to make the trip to this
week’s convention in Nashville – and will have to run a low-budget,
“outside the box” campaign if selected.

She hopes to capture the national media’s attention with a compelling
story, use her broadcaster’s communication skills to connect with the
public, tap social media, pick up the tea party vote, the Democrats unhappy
with Barack Obama, the Republicans unhappy with Mitt Romney, the
independents unhappy with both, and be the first president from a new party
since that tall, lanky guy from Illinois in 1860.

It’s a tough road, but she’s not worried: “It’s kind of a miracle to be
this far.”

Roth hosts a three-hour radio show on weeknights that is syndicated to 45
stations, including KSBN in Spokane. She regularly raises the alarm that
America is straying from conservative, Christian principles. She’s big on
the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and Ronald
Reagan. She considers President Barack Obama a usurper with a forged birth
certificate that has America teetering on a Marxist cliff. Presumptive
Republican nominee Mitt Romney is, to her, little more than a conservative
poser who waffles on abortion and gay marriage, and authored a
big-government health care system. She’d tell Muslim terrorists that Mecca
and Medina would be incinerated into glass for any new attack on U.S. soil.

A former singer who’d hosted radio talk shows in larger cities, Roth was
working in Spokane in 2005 when she collided with a deer one night on her
motorcycle, landing face first on the ground. The deer died, and she, too,
was almost “road kill.”

Helicoptered to a hospital near death, she was in a coma for two weeks, and
then faced questions of whether she’d ever walk or talk again. She had no
health insurance, and her show was dropped by the radio network. She went
through months of physical and speech therapy, and a year after the
accident was back on the air.

“I’m numb from my lips down,” Roth said. Perhaps most imposing for a talk
show host, she had to relearn how to speak.

She became a popular speaker at conservative meetings and tea party
gatherings. In December 2010, she was elected vice chairwoman of the
Spokane County Republican Party, part of a compromise that split leadership
posts between different factions of the GOP, party sources said. On one
side were traditional or “establishment” conservatives and on the other
were a coalition of former Libertarians who had backed Ron Paul for
president and evangelical Christians. Roth was identified with the latter.

Last summer she told party officials she was stepping down to run for
president, County Chairman Matt Pederson said. At the time she planned to
run as an independent, and couldn’t also be an official of a major party.

“*God put that on my heart a year ago,” Roth said of her decision to
run.*She wrote a book, “The People’s President,” that outlines her
platform.
Among the ideas is replacing the federal income tax and all other federal
taxes with a “point of purchase” tax that collects 2 percent for every
transaction, whether buying groceries, a car or a block of stocks. She
estimates it would raise between $10 trillion and $20 trillion a year and
wipe out the national debt in four years. It’s a simple idea – so simple
one might wonder why it hasn’t been tried already.

It’s not popular with a government that wants to control the public’s
buying habits and uses the Internal Revenue Service to exercise that
control, she contends.

Plans to run as an independent ran up against the hard reality of meeting
different rules in 50 states to qualify for the ballot. “It’s a nightmare
if you’re an independent,” she said.

Roth began looking at third party organizations, which have easier access
to ballots in many states. She found the Constitution Party, which believes
in strict adherence to its namesake document, Christian principles and low
taxes. She thinks it’s pretty close to the Republican Party – the “classic,
very pro-life, very conservative” Republican Party, not the “sellout,
50-yard line, establishment” Republican Party.

She secured support from state Constitution Party organizations in
Washington, California and Missouri, participated in a series of telephone
conference debates, and makes a speech to the convention delegates today.
Roth said that if she doesn’t get the top spot, she isn’t interested in the
vice presidential slot if offered. She’d have to pray on how to move
forward on a presidential quest.

If nominated, she can keep her radio show until August, when the Republican
and Democratic conventions formally pick their nominees. She’ll get guest
hosts during the fall campaign, and FCC regulations allow her to make
appearances. She won’t be able to overtly campaign, but the hosts will be
able to interview her on how the campaign is going.

And if elected? “I’d do the show from the White House,” she said. “I would
be a unique president.”
    Get more news and information at Spokesman.com<http://www.spokesman.com/>

-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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