What are the moral issues you feel guide your choice of candidate toward a Republican, and away from a Democrat? I can guess that abortion rights might be a large one, but I'm interested in your thoughts here.

Good question. I started looking for a good "Republicans vs. Democrats" kind of list which would give a good refrence point for a discussion, but came up with very little (though I honestly didn't look that far). So I'll just have to note a few issues of the top of my head:

Family Values
Abortion
Role of Government
Government Spending
National Defense

To expound upon the "Role of Government" bit:

My perception of the Democratic party is that they want to get very involved in people's lives. The programs Democrats propose seem to be largly about taking away from taxpayers to try and "fix" those who are in "need". While I believe in mercy, I don't believe it is the responsibility of the Government. The Government seems to bloat everything it does and be very ineffective, thus I don't feel I can trust where my taxes are going. I'd rather take the responsibilty of helping out others on my own, without relying on the government to do it. That's the reason I give money to my church and its outreach programs for less fortunate people.

On top of this, there are a lot of "needs" that I just don't agree with. Minorities should not get preferential treatment when applying to colleges (they should get equal treatment in every way). Children who fail in schools should be held back; otherwise any kind of evaluation is a joke. Criminals are put in jail to remove a threat of society and punish for wrongdoing, not rehabilitation. Not that rehabilitiation shouldn't be persued, but it should never be mistaken for the primary purpose. Of course these aren't the whole issues (probably aren't even current), but they do illustrate where I think Democratic thinking has gone wrong in the past.

Republicans, on the other hand, promote people taking responsibility for themselves. While government is a necessary evil, it should infringe on people's lives as little as possible. Ok, so admittedly the Republicans have not really produced on this one in some cases, but it is a goal I support. As much as we can reduce our government and determine ourselves where our money should go, the better.