You are trying to make points for poor UUs where they are not really relevant.
When I play Carthage I usually do it on water maps. Lately I tried playing with them on Continents to have an opportunity to use elephants, but also to not get completely screwed by having no UA. The result was that I still didn't build any elephants (maybe one in a game?). The thing is that land war in Civ 5 is waged using ranged units. When you are taking cities you usually only have two melee units to do the last hit, the rest is done by the comp bows. Elephant does have the aura which can be useful, but they are still a melee unit with a penalty against cities.
What is a bigger problem is that Elephants don't fit to Carthage. Yes, Carthage used elephants in some battles. No, it wasn't their symbol. No, it wasn't the backbone of their army. It's just a popculture icon, we are better than popculture.
Also two early UUs would suggest that Carthage would be some kind of early rusher. while they historically weren't. They waged wars to protect or expand their trade zones - fierce competition with Syracuse over Sicily comes to mind, and later conflicting spheres of influence with Rome which led to the Punic Wars. Carthage was a trade colony, which later became independent, rose to power and started creating its own trade colonies, subjugating nearby tribes (Libya, Numidians, Iberians). Their expansion was purely for resources and trade. Elephants definitely make sense for India, as even today they are bred, trained and used for hard labor. Carthage? Not so much.
I know that I repeat myself, but Carthage was a trade power, an economic power. Seafaring civilization focused on trade. All the exploration they did and all the wars they did were for economic reason (or to defend itself). Naval UU is fitting as they did create a very strong navy. Should it be quinquereme? I am not convinced as these ships were built by other nations too, though the Romans copied the design, but I think it fits well enough. Early access to it is also nice and fitting, extra strength makes sense, I would maybe think of some exploration bonus. Other than that it is fine.
Overall I don't really like the current UA. The gold is certainly useful, but it doesn't feel good. You get free monies others don't get. You don't work for it, it's just there. Yes, the more you expand, the more you get, but overexpansion might hurt you more than it helps. Yes, there are decisions involved as to what to do with that money, but it's still not exciting. Also with the current mechanic of barbarians looting gold from cities you can easily lose a lot of gold if you settle, especially since the amount looted seems proportional to the amount in bank. Early on gold is sparse so it's hard to keep all cities garrisoned (and sometimes they still steal even if you fight them with units).
I am with Funak in that I think Carthage needs a UB. Gazebo claims that not all civs have to have a UB/UI, but there are other civs who did get a UB. I already mentioned Rome - I don't think they needed a UB, as they were already a very strong civ with a great bonus helping them throughout the entire game, and combination of two UUs allowed them to have a conquering spree early on - which is fitting, as Rome did go and conquer everything around them. Carthage didn't.
The UA is only useful earlygame, later it becomes a very small bonus, the gold obviously makes it better but it also makes it even more of an early boon (because you don't settle that much late in the game, especially on higher difficulty levels where the AI starts expanding and founding like crazy). That's why I think the second part of the UA should put an emphasis on trade or some other economic bonus which is there throughout the game, ongoing, and not just bam, you get a pile of money when you do something (it doesn't really make sense to get gold when founding by the way, where does it come from?). And I would scrap the mountain crossing. It can be fun, but is extremely situational and when it does come into play it is not a large bonus. A detriment at its worst (you shouldn't automate workers as Carthage when you get a GG), a gimmick at its best.
