Cal Thomas on What Works

Hugh Hewitt on The Young

Here are two more in the steady
stream of conservative thoughtleaders who beat a path to
Centennial Institute. We know
what works to sustain a free and
virtuous country, say commentators
Cal Thomas and Hugh Hewitt, but
historical amnesia and half-baked
thinking get in the way. Look to
the states, urges Thomas. Teach the
young, challenges Hewitt.

opportunity is immense. Its not like the old days when we

had to knock on a door and ask someone to go to a caucus
with you or whatever. You can correspond 24/7 and do so
with immediacy, with vast reach. Its what my colleagues
from Townhall.com, Mary Katharine Ham and Guy Benson,
also speaking here at the Summit, are continually doing on
Twitter, on talk radio, and on all sorts of platforms that
didnt even exist when I got involved in my first campaign
in 1974.
5. Potential: Everyone has a mobile device;
everyone communicates constantly, but
theyre not on our political grid; not yet, not
fully. Imagine if we can bring them on. They
are a completely new forceand so to these
first 120 students, the Armstrong Fellows of
2014, I say thank you. (Applause.)

Colorado Christian University

8787 W. Alameda Ave.
Lakewood, CO 80226
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have to realize that marriage is a weight-bearing wall of the

West and we are for it. Were not against anyone. Were not
anti-gay. We are for what has worked for 2,500 years. Thats
how we have to argue.
8. Promised Land: These students average age is 18; I am
58 so I am that Biblical number, 40 years older than them.
I was thinking about the 18-year-old Israelite in Egypt. He
hears that Moses is going to lead the people out. Its exciting
and dramatic at first.

They will
lead if we
teach them.

Next year we hope its 240, the year after that 480; we hope
it grows and grows. If they each have in them 50 years
of activism, thats 6,000 years of political activism. Thats
millions and millions of conservative tweets. And it matters
because we are always one generation away from losing the
America we inherited.
6. Be For Things: As conservatives, we cannot just be
against things. We have to teach these students how to
be for things. Arthur Brooks at the American Enterprise
Institute, such an important public intellectual today, stresses
that we must be for people, especially the unemployed, the
unskilled, the chronically unlucky.
Ronald Reagan was for things; so was Senator Armstrong;
so are our best contenders for 2016. Dont allow the media
to define us as the party of no. Be the party of yesyes to
a different menu of choices from what the liberals serve up.
7. How to Argue: We have to be for the world. Be for
Israel as well as against Putin. Be for a Navy with 15 carrier
groups, for a fully capable Marine Corps and Air Force and
Army. Its not enough to just be against government waste.
We have to explain why we think it is best for a child to
have one mother and one father for their whole life. We
Centennial Review February 2015 4

Centennial Institute

Youve got the chariots behind you, the Red

Sea parting, the pillar of fire leading you
in the night. But then for the next 40 years
youre lost, and suddenly youre my age, 58
and tired.

When you finally see the Promised Land, the land of milk
and honey, the land of freedom, you realize you cant take
that land by yourself. You need this young generation to
enter in and take it. They will do that if we teach them
how. Thats what the Young Conservatives Leadership
Conference is all about.

Students Age 16-20

Register Now for
Young Conservatives
Leadership Conference II
Were the City on a Hill
June 21-26 at CCU
www.hewittccu.com
All the Great Ones, Almost,
Will be There. Will You?
Western Conservative Summit 2015
Your Story: Freedom Alive
June 26-28 in Denver
www.westernconservativesummit.com