What’s a state? For starters, an expanse of territory, a resident population, and a sovereign government. But there’s a lot more, when you think about it as I’ve tried to do in my new book, Backbone Colorado USA. A way of life, a set of values, shared history and traditions, all play a part. As Colorado marks 140 years of statehood this year, it has actually come to reflect a special state of mind.
Beware, politics isn't everything
Who do you like for President? Many Americans this year seem inclined to answer that question with another: What’s today? The polls are volatile. We’ve already seen surprises, and we’ll see more. This was going to be a column endorsing Romney. The straight-arrow entrepreneur is my guy. If Mitt quits, I’m for gruff Fred Thompson. I was also going to say that McCain and Huckabee, big-government egotists, are my least favorite—though preferable to any Democrat.
What if it's not possible to be both a good Muslim and a good American?
Can a good Muslim be a good American? Brian, a constitutional scholar, put the question to Michael, a national security expert, as we passed the Washington office of Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN), the first Muslim to serve there. Ellison’s decision to be sworn in on the Quran still echoes controversially.
Facing the Responsibility Deficit
The race to succeed Barack Obama is on, but remember this: Important as the 2016 election will be, whether the Republicans or the Democrats prevail is not going to keep our country from rolling into 2017 faced with the same ominous symptoms of decline. Another centennial for the USA is far from assured. Maybe our country will be around to celebrate 2076, but maybe America's goodness and glory will be but a sad memory by then. Historians warn that great nations undo themselves with moral and fiscal laxity after about 250 years. My timely book, Responsibility Reborn: A Citizen's Guide to the Next American Century, looks at our chances and maps the way forward. I argue that Uncle Sam's insolvency is only a symptom; irresponsibility as indulged by all of us is the fatal deficit we face. Saving our country starts with individuals looking in the mirror. Can we do it? Damn right we can. To learn more about the book and order your copy today, go to centennialccu.org and click Centennial Institute Store.
“End of discussion” won’t occur if Centennial Institute can help it
As chairman of the annual Western Conservative Summit, I was pleased to invite back for this year's edition our longtime friends and political allies, Mary Katharine Ham and Guy Benson, to talk about their important new book, End of Discussion: How the Left’s Outrage Industry Shuts Down Debate, Manipulates Voters, and Makes America Less Free. Both have spoken at several previous Summits, and Guy has road-tripped to places like Grand Junction CO and Scottsdale AZ on behalf of the Institute’s freedom message. Why the invitation? Because I see timeliness and urgency in Ham and Benson’s defense of the American ideal of open, spirited, civil debate in the public square, and in their case studies of assaults on that ideal by progressives. Their book valuably reinforces our mission at Centennial Institute, as Colorado Christian University’s think tank, to equip citizens "to be seekers of truth [and] to debunk spent ideas” (quoting from the CCU Strategic Objectives).
It is precisely for that reason, because America needs better citizenship and lots of it, that any good citizen with a thoughtful message is always welcome on our speaker platform. We’ve had Marxists, Darwinists, Freudians, Muslims, Jews, atheists, and gays, not in most cases to present a worldview we reject, but to further the discussion on great issues of the day, worldview aside. That open forum, all comers given a hearing, has been and will remain our policy.
Thus when Guy Benson recently stated he is gay — putting it on record for intellectual honesty and putting it in perspective as a mere footnote at the back of his and Mary Katharine Ham’s book — we viewed the disclosure as immaterial to our reasons for having invited the two authors months before. Neither is coming to the Summit to speak on gay marriage or on gayness in any way. They are coming to speak on keeping the public square open. What a surrender if Centennial Institute moved for its closure by suddenly declaring them unwelcome.
We program the Western Conservative Summit by weighing our invited speakers’ capability as advocates and the merits of their civic vision, not by appraising their personal lives. We’re not confident how well any of us could stand such an appraisal ourselves, if the secrets of all hearts were known. Rather, as followers of Jesus and servants of a Christian university, in our dealings with every individual, we want to live out what St. Paul called “the Gospel of God’s grace” (Acts 20:24).
Benson and Ham’s book title calls out one side of the political divide, the Left, for trying to shut down debate and thus make America less free. But neither side is guiltless. Centennial Institute, committed as we are to freedom, faith, and family, will not waver on those core truths as biblically proclaimed. Nor will we yield to anyone’s ad hominem call to end discussion, be it from Left or Right. Let the discussion flourish unafraid, we say. Let truth and error freely contend. We’re certain the truth will prevail.
