Your choice for Wisconsin’s next senator is just as important as your choice for president, and as students, sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters, we have a clear choice of who that should be. Rep. Tammy Baldwin, D-Madison, is the only candidate who has a decisive plan for making higher education more affordable and a commitment to keeping programs like Social Security and Medicare around for our senior citizens.

If you are attending school, thinking about going to school or have children going to school, Baldwin is your senator. She has consistently voted for measures that would make higher education more affordable. In 2009 Baldwin voted for the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which expanded Pell Grants by taking money away from big banks and putting that money towards education. Baldwin shows her commitment to education by continually fighting to keep student loan rates doubling.

As students, we need more people in Congress who support affordable education. However, education is not only a student’s concern – everybody stands to benefit from more people going to school.

It is through education we are able to develop new innovations that better society. Education is an investment we will all benefit from within our lifetimes. Few of today’s advancements in medicine and technology are made at random by people who have distanced themselves from education. New developments in medicine and technology are being made all the time in our universities and research labs by people who rely on their education to perform their jobs.

Baldwin knows the value and importance of Medicare and Social Security to America’s senior citizens. She was raised by her grandparents and understands how necessary these programs are to the people who have worked hard to build the country we live in.

In one of her most memorable quotes on Social Security and Medicare Baldwin said, “I regard them more as promises than programs,” reports the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. We need these programs so our senior citizens can retire with dignity. These are the people who have been responsible for feeding us, advising us and making the lives we live possible. Baldwin knows this, and she has a clear commitment to keeping these programs available to the people who have earned them.

Former Gov. Tommy Thompson has no commitment to education, and as a well-off senior citizen, he does not need to worry if Social Security and Medicare exist or not. Thompson has made it quite clear he intends to be the, “51st vote to pass [Rep.] Paul Ryan’s [R-Janesville] Pathway to Prosperity,” which would end Social Security as we know it.

There are so many key issues at stake in this election, both in our state and in our nation, and we in Wisconsin have the power to decide who controls the presidency and the Senate. Baldwin understands the struggles and aspirations of the people of Wisconsin and is the clear choice for senator.

Jared Mehre ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science and sociology with a certificate in criminal justice.