Strength in Numbers

Many twenty- and thirtysomething conservatives across America are probably at least a little disappointed to have missed the latest wave of campus culture: conservative caché. Reading their letters to the student paper, I have to admit that my entire experience with higher education might have been different had I been part of a group such as URI's Students for the Awareness of Conservatism. At the very least, it would have offered company for my multiple letters to the editor.

Here're Ryan Lospaluto's thoughts upon attending a Kerry presentation:

On Tuesday I went to see Senator and soon to be Democratic Presidential nominee John Kerry in Providence. Even though I am not on the same side of the political spectrum as Kerry I was excited to see him speak and eager to hear what he had to say.

I have to admit much of what he said sure sounded good. I mean, sure he wants to make life perfect for us and is willing to spend a lot of our own money to do it.

How encouraging it would have been, once upon a time, to have like-minded fellows with whom to play drinking games based on the amount of taxpayer money Clinton promised away with each State of the Union! In a comment to a post on Michael Williams's blog, Kurt quotes the astute 19th Century historian Alexander Tyler:

A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back to bondage.

I'd say we're pretty close to complacency and apathy, indeed, when it is more important that politicians promise handouts than that they have any prospects of actually being able to deliver. Spreading awareness of conservatism couldn't be a more timely endeavor.