I am sure that President Barack Obama does not expect the votes of very many billionaires, yet he knows he is the president of the United States and it his job to consider the interests of all and to treat all Americans with respect.

In 2008, Obama ran against a decorated war veteran, Sen. John McCain. Obama, having never served, did not get a lot of support from veterans.

He could have said, as Mitt Romney recently did, “These people will not vote for me so I do not have to consider their needs.”

To the contrary, however, President Obama made it a centerpiece of his domestic policy to help all veterans, never asking which ones voted for him.

When an oil spill threatened the Gulf Coast, my president did not say, “Well, those are just red states anyway, it is ‘not my job’ to help them.”

It is very disconcerting to know that Romney, if elected, will not see it “as his job” to be concerned with nearly half of all Americans, including me and most people I know.

How foolish of him to write off half the population before an election, but even worse is that he will care about only the people in America who vote for him.

A president must serve us all. Romney, if elected, would be the first president to have publicly declared that he does not care about 47 percent of Americans.

If he wins, will he even be able to keep a straight face as he looks us all in the eye and declares his commitment to moving our country forward, with us knowing all the while that he holds about half of us in such low esteem.

Charles Hicks

Manchester