Rubio’s personal history resonates with weekly GOP address and ‘Dream’ ad

US Senate candidate Marco Rubio (R) got right to the heart of a political matter on the minds of many when he delivered the weekly GOP address on Saturday. The former speaker of the Florida House said, “Today the American Dream is threatened by out of control politicians in Washington, who think that more government deficit spending is what it takes to grow our economy. That has never worked anywhere it’s been tried and it won’t work now.”

For Rubio, the American Dream is a personal issue. And for many of us whose personal history includes memories of growing up in small towns and rural areas, his personal history resonates.

My grandfather on my mother’s side was a sharecropper when he was young. My grandmother picked cotton. My mother wrote an account of her early years so both my children would know their own personal history. My father’s family was educated—most were self-employed or worked in advanced professions. The result for us was a dual heritage and being taught what made the difference—education. A chance to rise above circumstances of birth.

Rubio’s personal history was more perilous, however. His parents fled Cuba when the regime now in control socialized property and wealth.

He said, “Now for some it may be hard to imagine that the American Dream could actually be at risk, but as the son of exiles I know firsthand that it is possible to lose your country because my parents lost theirs…They came to America with virtually nothing.  My Mom worked as a factory worker, a maid and a stock clerk at K Mart. My Dad was a bartender. They made many sacrifices so we would know opportunities they never did…But you see our story is not unique. It’s the story of America. It’s our history. It’s our common heritage.”

The Republican candidate for the US Senate seat currently held by Sen. George LeMieux (R) by appointment acknowledged Floridians “are frustrated with arrogance in Washington.”

And he dropped what should be a bombshell—“...for the first time in our history, more than one million Floridians are out of work.”

He pointed to the uncertainty in the business sector—that uncertainty affects small businesses and large corporations. And he gave an overview based on specifics he put forth in his Ideas to Reclaim America.

Rubio said we should “abandon ideas like cap-and-trade and card check.” He also said Washington has to stop spending more money than the federal government takes in—he wants to use unspent Stimulus money to pay down the debt. And he wants ObamaCare repealed—“replace it with a plan that will lower health insurance costs for Americans without bankrupting the nation.”

Rubio’s latest commercial, ‘Dream,’ focuses on the common heritage many of us share—one that involves the sacrifices made by our parents, our  own individual determination to achieve our personal dreams, and a reminder of what we can lose when a country is taken over by thugs who enact policies based on ideology rather than on the liberties that set Americans apart from much of the rest of the world.

I can still remember my grandfather and grandmother’s struggle to feed their children and keep a roof over their heads. They were people of strong faith. Miraculously, they were happy and their love for each other never faltered. And somehow, despite many odds being stacked against them, they loved their country.

Their children and grandchildren have prospered by virtue of hard work, education and faith.

That’s the American Dream many of us sought, just like the Rubio family.

That’s the dream that terrorizes the left whose ideology is based on a single corporate entity—government.

And it’s the American Dream that resonates with the rest of us.

(Commentary by Kay B. Day/Aug. 28, 2010)