My earliest childhood memory involves watching an Abraham Lincoln re-enactor (possibly Hal Holbrooke, I’m not sure) debating Norman Mailer on The Dick Cavett Show. I remember being overwhelmed by the logic and passion that Lincoln brought to the argument about Republican values of diversity, inclusiveness and responsibility. I remember an incensed Mailer wailing his fists into the faux Lincoln until his top hat came to rest on Dick Cavett’s lap.

Wow, I thought, I want to grow up to be a Republican, much to the dismay of my brie-eating, tax-and-spend parents. Even though they sent me to Catholic school to receive a traditional liberal education, I longed for the day when I could cast my first vote for the Grand Old Party.

In high school, I worked on the Re-Elect Gerald Ford for President campaign. I proudly displayed my “Win with Ford” button over the crest of my blazer even though the other students made fun of me. They would mask their anti-Republican feelings with taunts about my heritage or sexuality, but I knew they were just being anti-American. After all, didn’t Ford get us out Vietnam?

In college, I headed up the campus pro-life squad, the Gays for Reagan cotillion and the Minorities for a New Day Committee. Armed with my red rose and a Reaganesque sense of can-do spirit, I worked tirelessly on my fellow collegians to sway them to vote for Republican candidates. I remember once leading a voter registration drive outside of the campus events center where the band the Minutemen were performing and almost getting into a fight with some intolerant small-minded Liberals. Thankfully, my boyfriend at the time, (who will remain anonymous because he is currently serving his 5th term in Congress and it would cause stress to his wife and children), came to my defense.

After college, I ran unsuccessfully for the Republican State Committee. Even though I was not elected, I was appointed to a special position of Minority Recruitment Chairperson. I wasn’t given a fancy desk, a budget or allowed to attend meetings, but just being able to tell people that I had been chosen for this special job made me feel like a real power broker. I knew nothing like this could ever happen to me in the other party. Let’s face it; the Democrats don’t exactly have to recruit minorities. They just throw government subsidies at them that are paid for by all of the hard-working Americans with jobs.

To this day I remain steadfast in my support of Republican candidates. My friends at the gay clubs question my motives. They try to spin the facts by telling me that Republicans consistently vote for measures that are anathema to the gay community. They lie and say that by forcing people off of welfare and taking away support for urban programs, that the Republican-lead Congress has an anti-minority agenda. They even suggested that because Nixon was caught on tape making disparaging remarks about Jews that he was somehow anti-Semitic. The lengths Libs will go to just to try and change my mind is frightening.

I remain a loyal Republican because my party doesn’t have to care about me. I have to care about me. See, when the president says that he “loves the sinner, but hates the sin,” I am the sinner in that scenario, and I love me. It’s the Liberals who want to confuse the issue by trying to allow for same sex marriages. My message is simple: hey, Liberals, stay out of my wedding chapel and I’ll stay out of your soup kitchens (except on gazpacho day – it’s fabulous!).

And when liberals say that the only way that minorities will gain a fair position in the world is through the Stalinistic forcing of affirmative action down the throats of corporations, colleges and, um, well, everything else, I say, nyet. Affirmative action says that minorities shouldn’t be judged by their accomplishments, just by their race. Just because minorities aren’t rising to positions of authority or even getting jobs isn’t due to racism, it’s because Liberals have over-taxed and suffocated the business community into a “whites only” hiring mentality.

And if there’s one party that is ever going to stand up to the National Rifle Association, it’s the Republicans. You never see a Republican candidate pandering to voters by having photo ops with duck hunters. You never see a Republican crying about what to do with an assault weapon. It’s the Liberals and their precious cities that have become the havens for illegal guns. No wonder they fear the NRA. The Republicans tell the NRA what to do and who to endorse. That helps me sleep at night. That and Ambien.

So as a Gay-African-Jewish American, I say Trump/Pence is the ticket for me. And if I ever start earning more than $200,000 a year, I’ll be glad they’re for me.