When a choice is really not a choice: voting is tough for me this year.

• Author: Wiesner, Pat
• Position: [on] MANAGEMENT - Viewpoint essay

Dwight Eisenhower was the first person I can remember voting for. It was in 1958, and I was 21. I didn't even know he was the Republican nominee; I voted for him because of his war record. He was a real war hero for every young person in the country and his Democratic opponent, Adlai Stevenson, never had a chance.

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But I remember how excited I was to vote and how important I thought my one vote was. That first time around I voted for Eisenhower, not a Republican.

I still feel the importance of my one vote, but over the years I have drifted more and more to the center right, voting mostly for Republicans mainly because I believe in small government and less taxes for the taxpayers.

I think it's important to say it this way because the fact is that 10 percent of the taxpayers pay 70 percent of all taxes paid. The only way to cut taxes for those who don't pay any is to give them money. I would normally choose opportunity over government redistribution of wealth, and competition over regulation.

So here we are in 2010 in Colorado faced with a weird state of affairs in our elections. And every year, our boss on ColoradoBiz, Bart Taylor, makes us declare ourselves on all the elections, statewide and national. This time it is difficult.

Here is my problem. Perhaps some of you share it and can offer some opinions. I am basically a Republican. Except for Kennedy and Clinton (once) I have always voted for Republicans. I think of myself as a middle of the road conservative. And now Bart wants to know how I will vote.

BALLOT ISSUES AND CHANGES

I'm against all this general election voting that cuts out our representatives. They are elected by us and should make these decisions. If we don't like it we can vote them out.

U.S. SENATOR

This one is easy. I will vote for Ken Buck hoping that he will move a little to the center as time goes on. First, because we should send as many messages as we can to President Obama indicating that his spending cannot continue. Buck will help with that. We should either not elect or un-elect as many Democrats we can to help with this message.

Secondly, I don't care for the advertising of either of them, but particularly I think Michael Bennet's ads are misleading...