George Allen visits the ‘burg

Former Va. governor came to Lynchburg to address political issues

Former Virginia Gov. and U.S. Sen. George Allen made a brief stop at Carol’s Place in Forest Tuesday, Sept. 25, where he spoke before a large crowd including students from Liberty’s Helms School of Government. Allen, who is running to reclaim the Senate seat he lost to Jim Webb in 2006, said that college students are the primary reason he decided to re-enter politics.

“The reason that I got into this election, is looking at the future through the eyes of our children,” Allen said. “Our oldest daughter graduated from college, and she eventually found work, but we saw her and others in her age group moving back home.”

For Allen, the erosion of the American Dream is unfair to the generation entering the work force.

“I read someone in the Washington Post who had a comment that young people’s expectations are too high, and I thought, ‘My goodness, this is America.’ In America, you should only be limited by your ingenuity, your imagination and your hard work,” Allen said.

Allen was championed by numerous other legislators, including long-time delegates Lacey Putney, Kathy Byron, T. Scott Garrett, 6th Dist. GOP Committee Chairman Wendell Walker as well as U.S. Congressman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA).

Allen spoke at length about tax reform, deregulation of energy production, and his desire to repeal the president’s signature domestic accomplishment — the hotly-debated Affordable Care Act.

The importance of the upcoming election cannot be understated, Allen said. Among those most affected are “anybody who uses electricity, drives a car and thinks that doctors and patients should make health care decisions.”

“For you people graduating from college, this is the worst job market since World War II,” Allen said. “One third of young people graduating from college move back home. Fifty percent are either unemployed or underemployed.”

According to Allen, the solution to the problem that college graduates face lies in a shift in the American attitude — one that rewards success and encourages growth.

“It’s absolutely essential that we reinvigorate the entrepreneurial spirit of our country with pro-job growth tax and regulatory and energy policies,” Allen said. “Our ideas are ones that work. They worked when I was governor — with lower taxes and prompt permitting and freezing college tuition, increasing the tuition assistance grants for private colleges.”

The college population, Allen said, should be the one that is the most enthusiastic for the Republican ticket.

“More taxes and more regulations … is not the solution. The solution is positive, constructive ideas so that young people, when they graduate from college, can enter their field of work, start their careers,” Allen said. “That’s why I think young people, more than anyone else, would be a demographic that should be on our side.”

Allen’s political career has spanned more than two decades. He has served Virginia in the House of Delegates, in the U.S. House of Representatives, as governor of Virginia and most recently as a U.S. Senator from 2001-2007. He is the son of the late Hall of Fame National Football League coach George Allen. Allen and his wife, Susan Brown, have three children — Forrest, Tyler and Brooke.