Reason for the Name

It has been said that if you want to keep your friends then don't talk about politics or religion. The top issues in marriages are money, sex, religion, kids, and education levels. The farther apart couples stand on these issues the more problems they have in their marriages. The closer couples are on these issues, the greater their chances for a successful marriage. It's pretty much the same with friends, unless we all just agree to disagree, which sometimes isn't easy.

A lot of people try to stay away from political discussions or even think about political things simply because of how upset you can become. The world is pretty messed up! How about the United States? Yep. Our great nation isn't perfect, but it sure is better than anywhere else, and anyone who thinks differently is simply naive. So, can it be even better? I believe it can be.

I want to start off by saying that I don't know what political party I "fit in" with. I don't want to be labeled as anything. I don't like the war policies of the republican party and I don't like the pathetic economic policies of the democratic party. Does that make me an independent? Sure doesn't. I'm not an independent either. Truth be told, I would like to start a new political party, but I'm pretty sure that's not going to happen. If I could start a new political party, it would be a party that focused on peace and prosperity. Republicans like war. Democrats love to tax, tax and tax. So, neither peace nor prosperity can both be found in either party.

The problem with both parties is that neither one really understands cause and effect. Republicans believe winning the war on terror means killing every last terrorist. Okay. But what happens after the terrorists are all dead? As soon as the terrorists are all dead, more terrorists will fill their spots. If you have a huge field and you pull up all the weeds and then you walk away thinking you've won the war on weeds, all the weeds will be back in a few weeks or months. So, what if instead up pulling up all the weeds in the field, you decide to make the ground infertile? Now weeds can't grow, and you never have to pull weeds. How does that translate to the war on terror? Think about it, because obviously the politicians haven't. How does a person become a terrorist? Did anyone ever ask the question, 'how do terrorists become terrorists?' Nope, and that's why we are going to have problems for a very long time. Terrorists become terrorists because of the beliefs they develop in their minds from their childhood to adulthood. If we want to win the war on terror we need to win the war of beliefs. I'm not talking about a religious war. I'm talking about bringing light and knowledge to the darkest corners of the world. How much is the cost of a school verses the cost of an F-22 Raptor fighter jet? An elementary school in the united states costs around $6.5 million verses $137.8 million for an F-22 Raptor fighter jet. The cost of the same school built in a 3rd world country would be significantly less. If we spent as much money helping underdeveloped countries put quality schools in every area that didn't have one as we do on national defense, the countries we helped would love us to death for our generosity and the rising generation would be well educated, prosperous, open minded and terrorism would ultimately disappear. Instead, we are just going to act like bullies who fuel more hatred toward us. Cause and effect.

Democrats have the same problem of not understanding cause and effect. They somehow believe that more government spending helps the economy. Actually more government spending destroys economic growth. Why? Because an influx of funds into government agencies and programs is unfortunately not seen as temporary. The budgets of those agencies and programs expand as a result of the influxes and call for more funding in the years that follow than they did before the spending spree. Thus, we pay more in taxes immediately and in the long term. The more we pay in taxes, the less we spend on other things which means companies and suppliers get less money, so they hire less people and everybody suffers. The bigger the government, the smaller the economy. Taxes will hurt more as we have less jobs to pay them. The irony is that lowering taxes actually increases government revenue more than raising taxes because less taxes means a larger economy and therefore more income for the government, but Democrats don't understand that. Cause and effect.

Every political party has a problem with understanding cause and effect. What I hope to do with this blog is take the issues that are facing us, strip them down with cause and effect thinking and offer solutions that politicians aren't smart enough to think of. I hope you enjoy reading my articles as much as I enjoy writing them. Please feel free to comment on anything you'd like to comment on. Thanks.

~Austin Elliott