Bennett William John - America the strong: conservative ideas to spark the next generation

T HE PURPOSE OF THIS BOOK IS to explain what conservatism means. It explains basic conservative principles, the reasons conservatives stand for them, and how they apply to challenges our country faces.

We live in a time when many Americans feel uncertain about the future. They worry about jobs and the economy. They worry about whether the next generation will have a standard of living as high as previous ones. Distrust of major political institutions runs deep. There are concerns about whether the country is on the right path, and even if it might be in decline.

Conservative principles speak to these problems. The United States was founded on conservative principles, and they helped America become a great and strong nation. They can help keep it strong for generations to come.

For that to happen, each generation must pass those principles on to the next. Each generation has to offer clear explanations of certain ideas and values to young people as they reach adulthood. That responsibility has much to do with whether the next generations future is dim or bright.

The idea for this book grew from questions a smart teenager asked her dad, one of the books coauthors, John Cribb. The questions came during their drives to school while listening to Bill Bennetts Morning in America, the conservative talk radio show hosted by this books other coauthor.

Questions like Why do terrorists want to kill Americans? and What do you think about global warming? and Why shouldnt rich people pay all the taxes?

And this one: Exactly what is a conservative, anyway?

Theyre the kind of questions some bright young people start to ask when theyre in high school or college, or perhaps when they start to vote or get their first full-time job. Questions they ask when they begin to realize that events in the news really do affect them, their family, their friends, and their country.

What is a conservative? This book answers that question and more than a hundred others about issues ranging from immigration to illegal drugs. It examines issues from a conservative standpoint and explains why conservative ideas are good for our country.

If you are a young person just beginning to pay attention to current affairs and politics, there are a couple of things you should know. The first is that nearly 40 percent of Americans consider themselves conservative. Nearly 25 percent consider themselves liberal (the opposite of conservative). So conservatives outnumber liberals by a fairly wide margin.

The second thing you should know is that despite their numbers, conservatives sometimes face questions and even sneering remarks about the values they stand for. Portions of the culture tend to depict conservatism as backward and wrongheaded. They may try to convince you that conservatives are mean-spirited, greedy, prejudiced people.

Most of the national mainstream media news organizations in the United States have a strong liberal bias. That includes ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and NPR. (Fox News is the major exception.) It also includes influential newspapers like the New York Times and the Washington Post.

Hollywood, likewise, is a famously liberal place, and many of the television programs and movies it produces have the same bias. They carry messages that belittle the values and attack the institutions many Americans respectmessages like sleeping around is fine, religious people are nuts, and businessmen dont care about poor people or the environment.

College campuses may be the most anti-conservative places in the country. Liberal professors dominate most faculties. At many universities, conservative ideas are shouted down or cut off. Instructors feel free to mock conservatives in the classroom, and administrators pay scant attention when their posters are torn down or their sensibilities offended, writes a rare conservative Ivy League professor.

Liberal politicians routinely paint conservatives as mean-spirited extremists. President Barack Obama, for example, who is probably the most liberal president in history, told Republicans in Congress, Stop just hating all the time.

In short, several of Americas elite institutions give out anti-conservative messages, some subtle and some not so subtle. The bearers of those messages arent interested in helping anyone understand conservative principles. Theyre interested in smearing those principles and, if you are conservative, then maybe you, too.