Monday, September 27, 2010

Republican Pledge to America

Last week the Republicans issued a "Pledge to America."  This pledge is their new governing agenda.  I have provided the link for the document at the bottom of this post under my sources.  I am registered with no party affiliation because I agree with George Washington, who in his farewell address warned against political parties.  However I am conservative.  The Republican Party has irritated me in recent years, by being far to moderate, i.e. John McCain.  However after reading the "Pledge to America," if they will really stick to these principles that they have laid out, I think I'm going to start liking the Republican Party more.

The main points of said pledge are as follows,
  • Creating jobs
  • Cutting spending
  • Reforming Congress
  • Repealing and Replacing the job-killing health care law
  • a strong national defense

Creating jobs is a must, the current unemployment rate sits at 9.6 percent.  Yes, I do know that President Obama and others in Congress have tried to help, but as usual when government tries to do something, they get the opposite of what they want, and the people who pay for this are the people.  August 2008, unemployment sat right at six percent.  Under the last two years of this administration, unemployment has risen 3.6 percent, and the deficit has risen four trillion dollars.




While I was already inclined to believe that the president's policies would not work, they have proven themselves not to work.  Do his ideas even make sense in and world?  In debt, and someone is going to spend there way out of debt??????  That doesn't even sound logical.  To create jobs, we have to do the hard thing that one one wants to do, I don't want to do it, I wish I could wake up in the morning and yay!  the economy is better.  Sorry, we have to be realistic.  We, the people, the government, we have to leave the economy alone.  It's called laissez faire.  The government leaves the market, the economy alone.  The problem with this solution is that the average American is impatient, so am I.  Adn we want the economy to be better tomorrow and it isn't so many Americans so and complain to the government, who are trying to get reelected so they turn around and pass a bill to "fix" the economy that only makes it worse, so people keep yelling, politicians keep passing bills.  It's one vicious circle.  What needs to happen, the politicians leave the economy alone, the people tough it out, which won't be easy, we are up for a rough and bumpy ride, and in time the economy will improve.  The ways to speed this along is less government intervention and lower taxes.  Then will the economy improve, and people will invest, and make bussiness and create jobs, and people have more money, so the government has more money, so there are less people living off the government, so the government doesn't need as much money, so that money can be used to paying off our debt or can be given back to the people who will spend it, then business make money, invest, create jobs and there are more people with more money and the cycle keeps going.  What a great cycle.

Cutting spending, well I touched on that a little.  But a few more points.  While it would be nice for the government to be able to give us all healthcare and other things, right now isn't the time to do so.  When we have no debt, or a very diminshed debt, then is the time to have the discussions about the government giving things away free, then is the time to discuss right and wrong, to big government and all the other issues that go into those arguments.   But until then, I don't even want to discuss those, we simply cannot afford any more social programs, we can't even afford the ones we have already. 

Reforming Congress.  If we could talk to the Founding Fathers, we would learn how very skeptical of government they were.  And you can't really blame them, there so called democracy was taxing them with no representation, they had no voice and less freedom, if that's the government you live under, why would you trust government?  You wouldn't which is why when the Constitution was being written, the Founding Fathers wrote the government in such a way that limited what they could do so the people's freedoms wouldn't suffer. My favorite movie of all time in 1776.  And in this movie, there are a couple lines that John Adams says about the Congress that I can undestand.  The first, " A second flood, a simple famine, plagues of locusts everywhere, or a cataclysmic earthquake, I'd accept with some despair. But no, You sent us Congress! Good God, Sir, was that fair?"  And the second, "I have come to the conclusion that one useless man is called a disgrace; that two are called a law firm, and that three or more become a Congress! And by God, I have had this Congress! For ten years, King George and his Parliament have gulled, cullied, and diddled these colonies with their illegal taxes! Stamp Acts, Townshend Acts, Sugar Acts, Tea Acts! And when we dared stand up like men, they have stopped our trade, seized our ships, blockaded our ports, burned our towns, and spilled our BLOOD! And still, this Congress refuses to grant ANY of my proposals on independence, even so much as the courtesty of open debate! Good God, what in hell are you waiting for?"  Do our representatives listen to us?  Do they read legislation?  Do they even know what they are voting for?  Who knows.  But right there is the issue.  We don't know, and we should.  Ideas to reform Congress include a "read the bill" reform, allowing more open and fair debate, and requiring that every bill contain a citation of  Constitutional authority.  Maybe we could get some real transparency in Congress.

Repealing health care seems rather straight forward.  Neither can we afford it, or is it constitutional.   After repealing health care, the government would focus on how to reform health care that would lower costs and protect American jobs.

We have been in the Middle East for 10 years now, we still have troops in Germany, Japan, parts of Asia, all over the world, and concering the Middle East, little has been accomplished.  A strong national defense would create a coherent strategy to deal with and defeat terroism.  This would include clean troop funding bills, keeping terrorists of American soil and fully funding missile defense.

















Sources

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