I have a confession

If you asked most of my family and friends to this day about my political beliefs they would tell you that I am a liberal. They would tell you that I hate Bush and everything about being a Republican. Some would even still remember me being pro-choice and also quite the pacifist. I was a supporter of Howard Dean in the last presidential election, and I even volunteered to help with his campaign in Texas. It was around that time that the change started. I wouldn't say it was much of a change really. It was more of a true insight into the real differences of the two political parties of our country. I was raised to be a liberal. I think I posted somewhere before that I came from a family of liberal Catholics. I have been taught from a young age that if you are a conservative you must be either stupid or crazy:

"Just ignore Uncle Frank. You know he is a bit insane, spouting out his conservative beliefs." **actually he is either insane or he is simply rebelling against the rest of the family**

"I can't believe how stupid those poor people are voting for the Republican party. Don't they know that the Democrats are the ones that are more supportive of them."** I have learned that if you are poor or black you are simply a dumbass if you are not a Democrat**

About the time that I graduated from Texas State my curiosity started to grow about the republican party. I think it is mainly because I am from a red state and I wanted to know as much as possible about the other party so as to argue against them more effectively. I was also curious as to why so many people were voting Republican? Do we really have that many stupid and/or cold hearted people? Are a majority of Americans really so easily deceived?

In Texas you always have plenty of Republicans to talk to, especially around San Marcos and College Station. I found that conservatives can be rather quiet or defensive when approached with questions about their political beliefs. The main reason being that liberals think that all conservatives are automatically stupid or crazy. They are attacked from the start or are ignored. Not many people would actually discuss politics with them unless they were conservatives as well. I noticed this mostly when I was an IA. I was required to assist and talk with the students at events and such. At one of the events we could not find Republicans who were willing to join an on campus debate. The reason being, the year before they were harassed and chased off stage before they got far at all into the debate. On election night I went around and talked to everyone about why they voted the way they did. Most of the people who voted for Bush seemed surprised when I didn't start attacking them from the first.

Now to my confession. I discovered through talking with many of both parties that I actually side more with the Republican party. Yes, once my family reads this I expect hate mail. That is okay. Just wanted everyone to know that I wasn't brain washed by Art. He actually came along after I decided that I was a conservative, or we probably wouldn't have got along very well from the first. If you want to blame on anyone I'd put it on the other Republicans I have been talking too through the time of the past presidential election and through my growing love of political theory. I would put most of the blame on writers such as Burke, Aquinas, Rawls (because he makes me so angry), and Aristotle(to name a few). Yes, they have had quite an influence on my political beliefs. I am a religious person who studies natural law. It is not possible for me to be a Democrat and have such beliefs. I started to really question my political stance when I took a political quiz awhile back and it put my beliefs closest with Dick Cheney. I thought it was hilarious at the time.

So here I will put a few of my political beliefs on the blog for the first time. I am not much for writing about them because I am a perfectionist in my writing. I want to make sure I get everything right, and the blog is not something I want to put a lot of time and research into. But here we go, I won't post too many. I guess just the hot issues:

1. I am pro-life. I did put earlier that I use to be pro-choice and that is true. My opinion changed, so sue me. Why did it change? Well, I find that no woman really wants an abortion. No, it is not something that a person seeks, it is something that you grudgingly go to as a last choice(unless you are sick). I think it is wrong to give women that option. I think it is cruel for women to be put in that position. It is not an easy out either. You are killing a child. The child is not born yet but it is a human being. I also do not think that this is a woman's issue. A child comes into a family. It is created by a man and a woman both. I think putting it simply on women takes the value away from the family. In short, abortion adds problems and solves nothing.

2. I am not against the war in Iraq. I was not happy about us going into Iraq to begin with, but I believe that it shows cowardice to pull out at this point. We need to show that we can complete what we have started. I think it is important to have stability in that part of the world for our own safety and if we do not insure stability to that region then it will only increase terrorism. I don't wish to spend much time on this topic because I am still more of a pacifist. I just realize that military action is still needed at times. This is one of them.

3. I am a firm believer in religious education. What can I say, I went to both public and private school growing up and I know there is no way in hell I would have my own children (the ones I will have several years from now) attend public school. Religion is very important for a moral basis of a person and should be part of the education process. That is all I will put for that one right now.

I would go on, but the post is already long enough, and it has taken forever to write. If you actually made it through the post thanks for reading. This is the first time I felt like typing something political. Would you guess that I am a political science major?