"Now is the time to restore the Promise of America. Many Americans have given up on this president but they haven’t ever thought about giving up. Not on themselves. Not on each other. And not on America. What is needed in our country today is not complicated or profound. It doesn't take a special government commission to tell us what America needs. What America needs is jobs. Lots of jobs. In the richest country in the history of the world, this Obama economy has crushed the middle class. Family income has fallen by $4,000, but health insurance premiums are higher, food prices are higher, utility bills are higher, and gasoline prices have doubled. Today more Americans wake up in poverty than ever before. Nearly one out of six Americans is living in poverty. Look around you. These are not strangers. These are our brothers and sisters, our fellow Americans." -- former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney
"We have a plan for a stronger middle class, with the goal of generating 12 million new jobs over the next four years. In a clean break from the Obama years, and frankly from the years before this president, we will keep federal spending at 20 percent of GDP, or less. That is enough. The choice is whether to put hard limits on economic growth, or hard limits on the size of government, and we choose to limit government. I learned a good deal about economics, and about America, from the author of the Reagan tax reforms – the great Jack Kemp. What gave Jack that incredible enthusiasm was his belief in the possibilities of free people, in the power of free enterprise and strong communities to overcome poverty and despair. We need that same optimism right now. And in our dealings with other nations, a Romney-Ryan administration will speak with confidence and clarity. Wherever men and women rise up for their own freedom, they will know that the American president is on their side. Instead of managing American decline, leaving allies to doubt us and adversaries to test us, we will act in the conviction that the United States is still the greatest force for peace and liberty that this world has ever known." -- Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), vice presidential nominee
"My concern is not Barack Obama's past; my concern is for the future - not his future, but the future of my grandchildren. And under this President, we burdened each of them with tens of thousands of dollars of debt, and a system that will collapse upon itself because he thinks we can prosper by punishing productivity and rewarding reckless irresponsibility. The Democrats say we ought to give Barack Obama credit for trying. That sounds like the nonsense of giving every kid a trophy for showing up. Friends, we're talking about leading the country, not playing on a third-grade soccer team! I realize this is the man who got a Nobel Peace Prize for what he would potentially do, but in the real world, you get the prize for producing something, not just promising it." -- former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee
"We have nothing to fear except our own unwillingness to defend what is naturally ours, our God-given rights. We have nothing to fear that should cause us to forget or relinquish our rights as free men and women. To thrive we must believe in ourselves again, and we must never -- never -- trade our liberty for any fleeting promise of security." -- Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.)
"We have a sluggish economy, burdened by Obama Administration policies that are weighing down our job creators. Middle class Americans, in cities and on farms, are bearing the brunt. The big government bureaucrats of the Obama administration have set their sights on our way of life. Instead of preserving family farms and ranches, President Obama's policies are effectively regulating them out of business. ... Folks, we won't be in this situation with Mitt Romney in the White House. He understands what it takes for businesses large and small to thrive." -- Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)