woody died from the huntington's disease he inherited from his mother which progressively silenced him throughout the 1950s and 60s his son recalled the irony of that song's history. i remember him coming home from the hospital and taking me to the backyard just him and me and him in teaching me the last three versus to "this land is your land" because if he thinks i don't learn them nobody will remember them. he can barely strum the guitar at this point and his friends think he is drunk or crazy and stick him in a room in a mental hospital. than when he can't write or talk or do anything at all anymore he hits -- everyone is singing his songs. kids are singing "this land is your land" at school and people talk about making it the national anthem. bob dylan and those others are copying him and he can't even react to it. the disease doesn't affect his

mind. he is in a mental institution and knows what is going on but he can't tell anyone how he feels for what he thinks. "this land is your land" began life with the title god bless america. you see the manuscript. it is god bless america and has some anti capitalists reverses that i don't remember singing in school. do you? a lot of americans never even heard them until january of 2009 when bruce springsteen and pete seeger sang them from the steps of the lincoln memorial at barack obama's inaugural concert and newspapers said that is the way woody wrote it? that is the way woody wrote it. i will leave you with a version that i think pretty well charts the progression of this song from the angry and bitter satire it was to the unofficial national anthem that eventually became. thank you for coming out and

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♪ [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you. [applause] >> you are watching 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books on c-span2's booktv. >> up next a panel discussion on conservative books from the 2011 young americans foundation national conservative student conference. this is about an hour.

>> nice to have bright eyed and bushy tail students. young america foundation in case you haven't heard of us is an educational organization promoting conservatism and our ideas on the nation's college campus through lectures, publications and conferencess. in the last year the foundation sponsored 600 lectors including addresses from sarah palin and karl rove, ben stein and many others. in 1998 the american foundation save ronald reagan's ranch in downtown santa barbara and uses it to educate young people about ronald reagan's ideas and how they apply today. visit our web site at youngamericafoundation.org or call usa-1776. we will start a book panel. we are used to youtube and the internet and my question is why reid? i want to find out because i have had a hard time recently getting back into books and

intellectualism but these guys will answer what to read and why we should read and we have some great panelists to talk about it. we have roger ream and catherine lopez. i will introduce them individually but i want to say before we get into the panel that this is important to build a base for intellectualism and conservatism and have the ideas and the true logic to defend your ideas and heavy battles on college campuses. or professors are first in intellectualism and a lot of that comes from books and a long line of philosophy. we hope to show what you should read so you can take down the logic of your college professors when they are pontificating and if you get the chance to question them you will have something good to say. our first speaker will be roger ream leaders will president of the fund for american studies. he was vice president of the development of citizens for a sound economy which is an

economic policy organization in d.c.. he served as a congressman and senior staff at the foundation for economic education. he is one of the founding members of a frank meyer society. maybe he will recommend one of his books and surge as secretary. please welcome the president of the fund for american studies, roger rain. [applause] >> thank you very much. it is great to see all of you here for the america foundation conference this summer. it really is a source of encouragement to people like me who came up 35 years ago through young americans for freedom and the american foundation. fund for american studies and other organizations working on campus in those dark old days. is just as dark for you guys.

great that you are spending a week. i have the highest admiration for young america foundation. i have known ron robinson for 35 years since we worked in campus politics to get there. have the greatest admiration for what they're doing with the ronald reagan ranch and programs like this they are sponsoring throughout the year around the country. i hope you will stay very active with young america's foundation during the coming academic year. it is a real pleasure to be here. i thought since i am first time might begin by talking about why this panel is being held and why it is important to read books. they say reading books is somewhat of a dying art with all the competing opportunities we have in our time but i think young america's foundation recognizes the importance of a cannon of literature. about america's founding ideas.

limited government and the free enterprise system by chairing this panel. by reading books we really get -- we develop a philosophical framework, those first principles that enable us to evaluate public policy and make judgments about ideas that come along. if we familiarize ourselves with the ideas of jefferson and madison and great economists like milton friedman and others, when we come across ideas that challenge us we can think about what it is those authors might have thought about those ideas. doesn't mean the conclusions we reached will always be the right conclusions but we have the framework to defend our beliefs when they are challenged. political science professor at the university of virginia, jim caesar, wrote an interesting

paper a few years ago. he made a distinction between think tanks and policy organizations and other organizations on the policy side versus those on the left. it was an interesting distinction that is relevant today i think because what caesar said is if you go into the heritage foundation or the cato institute for american enterprise institute or any conservative or libertarian organization you will see portraits of the great thinkers like john locke or edmund burke or jefferson, madison, friedman and others. we have this great intellectual tradition upon we base the proposals we support the day. if you go into a left wing think tank you don't find that. they don't have that great intellectual tradition.

they might have paul krugman or chris matthews or maureen dowd or russo or marks if they want to be honest but they generally don't. so it is very important for us to look back at those first principles. those foundations. those ideas. was important in my own intellectual development. my first piece of advice for you is to become familiar with our founding ideas. you can go to the or original thinkers. unlike most americans, read the declaration of independence. read the constitution. there are important things in there. when jefferson writes one of his complaints against england and george iii is he said swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance, it sounds familiar. very relevant today. you have to know the tenth

amendment. in article i section viii congress is only given 20 hours. the rest are left to the states or the people. those are things is important for conservatives to be aware of. the federalist papers is a great source. how to protect minority rights. the anti federalist arguments are very important for conservatives to know. the first principle drawn from john locke and adam smith, very important to go back to those original sources to get firm grounding of our beliefs. i recommend david mccullough and david hackett fischer and joseph ellis who write about the founding period. they are historians who know how to write and bring history alive. those books have been best sellers in our country. those i recommend. for me when i was in my formative student years, i came across a book called the law.

have any of you read that? may be 5% of you at most. i highly recommend a book called the law by frederick bossya. it was published in france in the middle of the nineteenth century. don't hold that against him. countering the ideas of socialists in france at that time. it is such a clear arguments for freedom and limited government based on moral principles and principles of justice that it is a must read for young conservatives. you can get it from the foundation for economic education in irvington, new york. they kept it in print 50 or 60 years. he talks about how our language

has become perverted. he could be talking about policy today. legal plunder of government using its means for things that are not appropriate and i will just share a paragraph. see if the law takes from some persons what belongs to them and give it to other persons to whom it does not belong. .. >> it'll really ground your beliefs. another favorite of mine is a book by tom seoul, a conflict of visions. you really can't go wrong reading any of thomas' books. they are all excellent, and he continues to turn them out. he's a book on basic economics if you want to understand

economics, but a conflict of visions is a book that really contrasts the left and the right. it contrasts our view of human nature versus the lefts' view of human nature. he looks at freedom, equality, power, rights, and when we use them, when people who come in our tradition use those words, we mean one thing, and when the left uses them, it means something very different. it's a powerful book to defend your beliefs, helping you understand where people who you're intellectually engaged with may be coming from. he makes the case of locke, smith, versus john ralls. it's an easy read, an excellent book as are any books by tom. economics and one lesson by henry hazlet is a classic in

understanding free market economics. he wrote a number of books. he wrote very important books demolishing the idea that government can stimulate the economy by spending money, something that unfortunately the current administration didn't read or learn. they are counterproductive, slow growth, and this doesn't work. hazlet borrowed an important lesson about the fallacy of the broken window which i won't share today, but the disasters, the destruction can actually prompt economic groapt as a terrible -- growth is a terrible myth, and yet you see it with a natural disaster and some liberal says this is a good thick for the economy because they have to rebuild the houses, but they ignore looking at the other side.

someone in young americans for freedom with ron robinson and myself compiled a book called the "the libertarian reader" which starts with a section of the bible and goes up to current readings. just a great survey of literature of writings about free markets, about limited government, about the rule of law, about justice. i recommend that published by the cato institute. there's another one called "libertarianism" which he wrote. you may not agree with all points of view, but they present great arguments for limited government. i'd be remiss without mentioning a friend of mine, fun for america's program, an organization i work for now with mark levin. we are great friends there, and mark wrote a book --

[applause] yeah. two years ago, a best seller, a run away best seller, "liberty and terneny," another great introduction to the ideas we're talking about here, which i highly recommend, "liberty and tyranny". read adam smith's, "wealth of nation". also a great book for you to be familiar with, "human action," and i read that in my early twenties,. it's a dense book but readable, and gives you just the whole a to z understanding of the austrian school of economics, of free market economics. he wrote socialism, a great rebuttal of socialist idea.

i love "give me a break," and it's a great introduction to free market ideas by john, now who is on fox business. the road to serfdom is a timely warning to us how encroachment of government through regulation, through a larger and larger state, control of our lives puts us on a path towards the road of toal tearianism or fascism or socialism. i'm -- what i'll do is past out a reading list i prepared. it's also on the website if you want to go to the website. it's www.tfas.org/books, and there's some lists of recommendations of books and films that i think are great at

conveying ideas. i have recommendations of books about the movement. you can read about the history of this. wayne wrote a book who is on the young america's foundation board i believe, just a year ago, a generation awakes. young americans for freedom, the creation of the con sirvetive -- conservative movement. there's a book called "upstream" which is excellent. radicals for capitalism i think is another excellent book about the history of the movement for freedom, particularly touching on various straining of the libertarian movement. biographies, very few better than by clarence thomas' biography, "my grandfather's son," an outstanding book. walter williams published "up from the projects." there's laugh out loud lines in it as you'd expect from walter

williams. there's "man of letters," a book reflecting on his life. finally, i wanted to touch on books about communism that were very informative to me, perhaps the most enduring account is a book pi neyang. it's a harrowing and sad account of what happened to her during the cultural revolution in china. she just passed away here in washington about two years ago, and we had her speak to the students when she was alive, just an incredible woman with an incredible account of communism at that time. "black book of communism," another depressing the of life in the former soviet union. there's great books about history. the forgotten man and new deal

by burt -- both shattering the commonly taught myths about the great depression and showing how the policies of fdr didn't get us out of the depression, but prolonged the depression. there's another book i recommend. finally, i would say that probably the best book i can think about on communism that i left off is "animal farm" which hopefully you've read. it describes what's happening in cuba today, north korea, certainly. his book "1984", "a brave new world," a lot of great novels with lessons for us. we talked about rand, and i know more and more people who are in this movement for freedom that were introduced to these ideas by reading "atlas shrugged".

they are not necessarily randans today, but they are great novels in introducing people to the fear of the growth of government. certainly, they were important books to me while i was in my 20s and i was exposed to a short book, "anthem" as well. i'll pass out the list this afternoon. maybe someone on the young america's foundation staff can do that. i will say this, on the back page of the handouts, there's gold seals on about 5 -- that 25* of these, and if you have a seal, you can choose a book i'll be giving away. if you have a gold seal, they are yours, but happy to answer more questions. let me just encourage you, you got a few more weeks before you go back to college. read, read, read. go to the beach and reach.

certainly you can read the law on the beach or mark levin or other great authors like that, riding the bus, at the airport terminal, riding on an airplane or whenever, and you'll be better for it. thank you. [applause] >> who here has been to sea pac? who is going this coming year? if anything goes wrong, blame this guy over here. [laughter] our next speaker is christopher malagisi. he is -- he's the director of cpac, also -- also an adjunct professor. i think he's not liberal -- i hope not -- no, okay. christopher malagisi, ladies and gentlemen. [applause]

>> good afternoon. >> hi. >> let's try that again -- good! we get the last panel, and we talk about books. i love it. i love this stuff. it's an honor to be here. i was sitting there not too long ago, such as yourself, and i went to a young america's foundation luncheon, and i heard anne coulter, and i was hook, line, and sinker. you are the hard core of the hard core coming out in the summer of 90 degrees. yes, you can clap. that's all right, yes. [applause] so, saying in the introduction, i teach a class at american university called history of the conservative movement, 1945-present. yes, they actually let me teach that there. basically, when i start my class on the very first day, the very first class, the first question

that i ask everyone is what is conservatism? typically i get the normal thing well, they are for less taxes, pro-life, they want to win the wars. i said, okay, but fundamentally though, what is conservatism? what are conservatives inherently trying to conserve? i think you can sum it up in two words, "american exceptionalism," something that may have been talked about this week once or twice. american exceptionalism -- america is unique and exceptional for its place and time in history in the world. there are five first prince. principles. they are ideas on what are our first principles? the first is a constitutionally limited government. the idea that government should do what it's just supposed to do; right?

the second is individual liberty, that we should promote the max myization of dpreem, but with the rights comes responsibilities as well. the third is the idea of promoting a free market economy where everybody has an opportunity at the american deem. fourth is having a strong national defense and protecting america here and abroad, and the fifth is preserving our traditional values. why do i say these in the beginning here? the reason i structured the presentation was based on the books i'm going to talk about, and roger hit on a lot of good ones are based on the five first principles and what they mean. you know, conservatism itself has not and never been a yiewn vocal entity. it's a philosophy, but not an ideology. there's three groups. there's the classical liberals and libertarians focusing on

limited government, individual liberty aspects. there's the traditionalists, the social conservatives believing in a moral order passing from one generation to the next to better society, and the third is the anti-communist or the national security, defense conservatives that tag on to the whole strong american foreign policy and military presence, so keep that in mind as i go through this because i'll try to break down books based on that depending on interests. obviously, different people emphasize different aspects. someone could be more fiscal than social or vice versa, but depending on your interest, how i break down the class is through these books or as pelgts of the books. first is what i consider the gospel of the conservative movement. write this one doing. it's a book by dr. george hnsah,.

he wrote an unbelievable book called the conserve titch intellectual movement in america since 1945. you know how somebody asks you, what one book changed your life? well, you know, i hope you know in america, if you pay attention to politics more than seven minutes a week, you're not normal. you know that; right? the average person pays attention to politics less than seven minutes a week. there's 5 theory about that. people are getting to espn and pass through fox and cnn, it's probably more like four minutes, but this is one book that when you read, first six chapters in particular is what i require for the class. it talks about the intellectual foundations of conservative thought. have you wondered to yourselves why do i want a limited government? why are low taxes good? why is having a strong national defense a good thing? this is a book to help answer

that and kind of give you a background in where -- where those ideas come from. a good book that complements it well is a book by dr. lee edwards who is heritage scholar at the heritage foundation for the center for american studies. he wrote a book called the conservative revolution, the movement that remade america. why this is a really good complement to nash's book is this book is more of the con clog call -- chronological history since 1945. you get the philosophical stuff, and edwards gives you the cronology. the first is senator robert taft from ohio, the first unofficial conservative elected in government. then he talks about mr. conservative, barry goldwater ran in 1964 for the republican nomination, and so

-- to some of the old-timers, they got their start there, and mr. president, ronald reagan, and why he's so important in the cronology of the movement. the fourth, mr. speaker, talking about newt gingrich in the 1994 republican revolution where the republicans for the first time -- a conservative revolution in many respects, took over congress for the first time in 40 years. the third book i use for the history of the conservative movement, and i don't want to take the thunder away, but bull 's history of miles gone by. the first gentleman there to the right, william f. buckwheat jr., get to know him. he was cool before conservatives were cool. he made it cool. he personified the movement and articulated it for an entire generation. his magazine, which many of you read, "national review," the

goal was to consolidate the conservative movement, the fiscal, social, and defense wings together. he's the god father of the movement if you will. i consider him my hero, but go on youtube and look up bill buckly with the fires line. there's a show for 33 years, over 15,000 episodes interviewing everybody talking about the issues of the day. you want to see hugh hefner, check him out at 30 years old. it's interesting. those are the three books. so, getting into the three legs of the conservative movement, roger hit on some of the books, but there's other books that are pretty good. if you're the fiscal type, he

hit on the road to serfdom which i couldn't agree more. that probably kicked often the movement. the book came out in 1944, world war ii was still going on, and actually the book itself was not all that popular when it initially hit stores. "reader's die jest" took that book, but it in a form of 100 pages, and readers digest at the time was the people's magazine, but more intellectual. they were able to make it into a form so people could understand free market ideas and principles. it's still around -- it's actually on the intrrnt if you looked it up. you don't have to buy the book, just read the readers digest version if you want. economics in one lesson. that one lesson is 26 charmeds, but it's a great book.

the third, most important, is milton friedman. i love this man -- [applause] yes, yes. [applause] he wrote two great books, freedom to choose and capitalism in freedom, and the thee thesis was this, economic conditions is a condition for political freedom. if you want to articulate modern day economics, it's milton freed maren, and he gave more than most others in regards to free market economics. that's the fiscal part. the social part, the traditionalist, there's three or four individuals that wrote these amazing books that if you want to understand a little bit more about if you tend to be socially conservative, pro-life and otherwise, where do those ideas come from and why do we value life, marriage, and all these other things we hold dear? first doesn't get enough credit, but probably jump started the

wing in the movement. a man of the name by richard weaver writing a book called "ideas have consequences." it's 150 #-160 pages, and the thesis is man started to drift morally, if you will, when we flirted with the idea of something called nominalism, the idea that there's no such thing as universal truths. we try to base the philosophy on natural law and natural rights and everything is relative, there's no such thing as shades of gray. it's a great book that kicks it off. the second book is by the conservative mind. it was written by russell kirk. he provided the intellectual heritage of america. you can link it all the way back from ed jmin burke to ts elliot,

but talks about john adams being a modern day conservatives and others who plays a big part. it's hard to get through and long, but there's an intellectual link. the third is not talked about, but it's my favorite. it's called "the quest for community and io -- identity. ifs they talk about the ideas of getting away from universal truths. those are for the social conservative wing. the anticommunist defense wing, two books you have to read or parts of it. someone who doesn't get enough credit and like roger and others is a man by the name of james. he wrote three books in particular from 1947 to 1953 that supplied the conservative intellectual movement in regards

to defeating communism. the struggle for the world sticks out the best. why he's important is ronald reagan said that it was through those books and she uses and if you want to know where his ideas come from are traced back to james. another movement as i think roger mentioned is "witness". chambers wrote a fascinating story about a former come mewist who becomes the editor of "time" and was a spy for the communists and turn of leaf became an ex-communists and was a leader of the conservative movement getting americans to understand the threat of communism. it's funny. i had a student in my class ask me when we were talking communism, and she said, well, i get that communism was bad, but

why was it bad again? [laughter] i'm like how old are you? she said, 20. i was like, well, i understand the cold war may have ended before you were born, but where in the public school education or anywhere did you lose the joseph stalin, len non, the five year plan, and it's amazing how important it is to learn about why the cold war played an important role with the conservative movement. it's an 800-page book. if you don't want to read it all, that's fine, just read the introduction called letters to my children. it's a forward, about 40 pages 24, but he sums up why we needed to win the cold war, and that this is not necessarily a fight of man verse man, but god verse man in many ways. there is two e reconcilable fates. great book. the last book is someone who i talked about before, a man who i

don't think gets enough credit for fusing the conservative movement, but it's frank meyer, and he was a national review editor, another former communist as well and made it his mission to fuse together three legs of the conservative stool, and it was personified in a book he helped write in 1964 called "what is conservatism?" they got a lot of authors to bang heads and work together here. it's the year that barry goldwater ran for president, and it was perfect timing 234 jump starting the movement. there's other books too, but last but not least, remiss if i didn't mention the book about the conservative movement funding called the "funding fathers" a great book about the movement and who funded it. ever know of -- of course, over 21, but joseph coors?

coors beer? he was a big financier, still is, but you can read about that. please come out to cpac. we want to see you. half the attendees are under 25. it's a great exciting time to see part of idles or conservative movement leaders and activists, february 9-11 # in dc. i'll be around after if you have questions, and thanks very much america's young foundation. [applause] >> well, next panelist has relation to three things mentioned. hugh hefner, national review, and bucly. our next speaker, captain lopez has been featured in "playboy". it was an editorial piece, not a center fold. [laughter] i remember reading it, it was not a clean piece, but it was

very, very widespread. look that up. he's more well known for being the online editor of national review. she's an award winning journalist, and she says that she doesn't really work much with national review on the dead tree, but the online version, and she brings it to life. she appeared on cnn, fox news, msnbc, and the oxygen channel too, a frequent guest on radio tv. welcome to the stage panelists, kathryn lopez. [applause] >> i forgot about that playboy thing, thank you. no, they actually spent an entire article moshing an article i wrote which was pretty impressive i thought, or at least an interesting thing to put in the bio. i'll be upfront here.

by the time we finish the panel, you'll have ordered "witness" on amazon i think because i do too also mention that. thank you very much for being here. i was at this conference. i don't remember how many years ago, but it was awhile ago now. further back than when you were at the young america's foundation lunch chon, so it's great, always great to be back. i am perfect to be on the panel because i worked hard not to write a book, and i figure i'm here in a role i'm comfortable in. that's whatnot to do. to give a better picture why i'm perfect to talk about books. here's my weekend. last saturday, i tweeted. try over 150 tweets about the debt ceiling debate. i stopped counting at 150 because i couldn't face the knew mare call truths. if you gave me enough time, i,

the author of the tweets, might remember something i produced at 140 characters or less dropping vowels along the way, but not because anything i produced was particularly memorable. don't get me wrong, i use twitter and facebook and blog and i use my blackberry as an add accident in question. i -- addict. i see the value, but living in our modern moments and availing ourselves of technology, we ought to avoid letting the distractionses devour us, which can be easy. i had an uncomfortable sense that someone or something had been tinkering with my brain, remapping the circuits and reprogramming the memory. my mind is not going as far as i can tell, but it's changing. i'm not thinking like i used to, and i can feel it when i read. immersing myself in a book.

my mind gets caught up in the narrative, and i spend hours scrolling through long stretches of prose. this is not what i did last weekend. that's rarely the case anymore. now my concentration drifts after two or three pages. sound familiar? i get restless, look for something else to do, dragging my brain back to the text. the deep reading that used to come naturally is a struggle. i didn't write that, but i could have. the author of an article a few years back called "is google making me stupid," later the basis for a book on this cultural remapping given the fact he bothered to write a book, it's safe to say the struggle these days a worth it. i have evidence -- my evidence to google has made me stupid is the fact where i used to go into my brain to remember facts, i now google to find them.

anyhow, as it happens, i've been to a number of funerals in the last few months. funerals -- don't feel sorry for me because they are great celebrations of one's life if it was well lived. that's no news to you that frequently sermons and eulogies borrowed from writers who had gone before. the last funeral was the former research director, and i can't begin to relay the beautiful sendoff it was, but she who appreciated and helped craft good writing and go back to national review for so much good writing there besides the ideas, she would have loved that during courses of the brother who was a catholic priest brings friends to gnuman and his body of writing. a few funerals before that was

dr. bernard, a leading abortionists, the appeal abortion law, pro-choice america. he, in his 1996 autobiography, hand of god, he wrote, ultrasound opens up a new world. we can really see the human, measure it, observe it, watch it, and indeed bond with it and love it. i began to do that. had a conversion rmt he said, having looked at the ultrasound, i could no longer go on as before. beside recalling the writing and conversion, during the funeral sermon, the father jerry murray actually said, and -- we get to witness here -- he reminds me of another great witness against evil in favor of the truth in the 20th century.

i read somewhere the feminist for mother thought the same thing, but i'm certain for different reasons. he renounced membership in the communism party and spoke out against those who wanted to harm our nation. he confessed to being a spy, vilified, suffered, stood number #* firm, and spoke the truth. the introduction to his book "witness" is forged in the form of a letter to his children. this quotation captures the courageous witness on behalf of innocent human beings killed by abortion. the quote is, "a man is not a witness against something. that is only incidental to the fact he's a witness for something. a witness in the sense that i'm using the word is a man whose life and faith are completely one that when the challenge comes to step out and testify for his faith, he does so, this regarding all risks and accepting all consequences."

i borrowed a quote from hand of god and offer you witness in this perhaps round about way because i think there's obviously worth reading, but my purpose here today isn't necessarily because i'm last on the panel, and how many books are left? it's not to hand you a list, but offer suggestions about guidelines, at the heart of why i chose to mention the funerals in general. i'm currently reading, actually the bill's research directorrings copy of an open air pulpit, wouldn't be on a list of conservative books, but the sentiments that are there, and it's important not just to read books that are on a conservative reading list. when i really wish -- what i wish i could get the opinion of bill buckley or newhouse, a conservative intellectual on a current matter, editor of first

things magazine, read what they left us. my father died over a decade ago, but he's still giving me gifts is what i think of it is, among them is books. when i read, there's a connection there. living ties to the past are in books, and there's a continued learning there. our bookshelves can be houses of great wealth, house great wealth, or kipped les or ipads house great wealth, however it is you prefer to read books. good books give a view beyond what everyone is tweeting right now. they give us history. they give us creativity. they make us more creative. they are an essential part to have the culture and traditions. they keep us from making mistakes. same mistakes people made before even though we will anyway. often times. i also recommend making time in your reading diet for magazines. this is shameless plug to time.

i'm not only saying that because i work for one and subscriptions to it pay my salary, however you do it, digitally or paper and binding, some people still do that, i recommend it. sometimes it seems a luxury anymore to let things settle a little bit before diving 234 and commenting. there was a incident this afternoon where i commented way too fast. magazines allow for more reflection, more digging, a little more context, and, yes, we do offer digital subscriptions to national review. go to nationalreview.com. that commercial is a long way of relaying this. yesterday, i was reading a catholic magazine of sorts. there's reflections and assorted spiritual commentary. yesterday's was on the gospel reading of the day and it was by a brit ire dominican priest and

ended with, "i shall never be interested in religion until i have come to see that i make it personal to myself, chew it, digest it, form out of it my spiritual being." i think that same can be said of the intellectual life. it's not just for those who subscribe themselves as intellectuals. if you think yourself a conservative, don't just be an activist on campus which can, of course, be terrific and important thing at the schools you're at, and i know a worthwhile focus of this week that you have here in washington, but also take advantage of those classes your taking that make you read books, especially good books. take classes where you can, where you have the freedom to, that make you read books. i frequently get asked -- i didn't do enough of that in college which is why i say that -- i frequently get asked if you have to be a journalism major to do whatever it is i do. absolutely not.

be a literature major, a history major. i was a philosophy and politics major. the latter had a lot of book reading. a lot of philosophy, too, as it happened in the politics i took. it helps with the thinking that comes in handy as you will not be surprised to learn. if you're a senior leaving class time, create yourself a routine for reading books that works for you. don't let the tweeting and busyness of life keep you from it. don't reread, just chew them, digest them, good reading about good things influence you how you think and reflect who you are, and how you communicate. it will influence, make your writing better, and if you really read quality writing, not that my tweets don't compete with the finist of literature.

i brought it up because i think it's important to read things that challenge and nourish you, not just politically. being a conservative is not only a political act. the need of political conferences is such that we don't reflect on this, but religious faith has had a place in the conservative movement, and not as a mere side bar. watch some of the old episodes of firing line as was suggested, and you'll see that. not only hugh hefner, but mother teresa and a famous convert about christianity and what it means and why anyone would believe it. i actually spoke a couple years ago, if you read back issues of national review, you'll see that as well, reflected on the cover even at times. as everyone suggested, read bill

buckley. there was a conference focused just on bill buckley and how it forms all the things for which we best know him, how they came up in his writing, and how it was just essential to how he was. some of the conservative forefathers had deep faith brought to their vocations as writers, activists, and leaders. national review has a long history now of having been established in 1955. it's a good place to start and come back to. i'd say that if i didn't work for national review, and i think you can believe me because others have suggested as much as well. you can read old articles with your iphone app i'm told. if you don't have an iphone, subscribe to the weekly nr original e-mail news letter giving you the actual text right in your e-mail box getting a taste of old pieces every friday

morning. it's not a book mind you, but it's a vast spotting. take a book and read it. maybe start with "miles gone by" or just start with a collection. there's a new one after he died with the buckley-like title, half a century of i lym nations. if any of you have watched firing lines, you understand why that's bill buckley like. it doesn't do it justice. it's very, very easy to read one essay at a time. read books, i remember -- rebooks about people you add meyer, people you think you admire. read books about people who are admirable and you know nothing about. i'm thankful for my friend for writing a biography of of

bonehoeffer. this won't come up on a reading list, but i knew little about the lutheran pastor who was billed by the nazis. i know a lot about him now. don't buy a self-help book. just read good books about good people. take in good influences. don't read books you know you agree with either. one of my favorite books is john williams books. i was more interested in the one sections i didn't agree with. what's keeping him from being a conservative. read books that challenge you and truly give you something that you can give to others in one way or another.

i know you have lists. you will have lists. been staring at my this whole time wrote a great one years ago on national review, and i put a link it up to yesterday afternoon. i'll tweet it this afternoon at kathryn lopez. i mention i tweet, i think. more than a few years ago, the compiled list of nonfiction books of the 20th century put together by book authors themselves like john keegan and jeffrey hart, all authors i recommend. when bill buckley died, there was walk throughs of his books, favorites, and recommendations from his students about that what to read first and what to read if you are interested in x, y, and z. happy to send that to anybody.

if forced to, i will have the pile of lists, but to be honest, reading lists after awhile, i just find stressful. if you saw the review copies in the office, you'd understand. i get free copies of new books coming out. northeast books i have -- most books i haven't read, or i feel like that most days. maybe this gives you more freedom and some guidelines instead of more books to add to the list. i hope some was helpful, and i'd love to share more actual titles during the q&a. thanks so much. [applause] >> all right. i'll ask the starting question, but after that opening it up for questions. if you guys could recommend, two

books, what one liberal book would you recommend to study the other side and how they think, and the other book i want to know is if you are new to conservatism, that's the one book to start with, and then we'll open it up to questions after this. >> tough questions. i think one on conservatism, i guess it's hard to say. i might say a conflict of visions by tom soul, but that's giving you the contrast ideas of conservatives and liberals. chris will probably be better on that. it occurred to me listening to others speak, i don't think we mentioned reagan in terms of his writings, and reagan and his words and books published after he died of his columns, radio

commentaries, they give you an expains #* pansive view of -- expansive view on so many topics only how reagan could write. i was reading some the other day and martin anderson and others edited those. i recommend those to get a survey of conservatism ideas. i'm not sure about liberals. i read the theory of justice in college making the case for redistribution, and so that's one that makes the liberal argument to redistribute the wealth. >> the letter to a young conservative is a great book. he uses a lot of stories talking about how he came to conservatism. if you don't know, he was the gentleman in the back over

there. i love these posters. he and others started the dartmouth review and the college version of it, the fore front of conservative online newspapers on college campuses. a book about the left -- i don't know about left, but two -- i forget the last name, but a conservative history of the american left is a book that i'm reading now, and i can't remember -- dan flynn. that's it. the conservative history of the american left. he traces the socialist utopians up to the modern day obamacrats and their vision for america and goes through the progressive movement with wilson, fdr, the great society. if you had to do a liberal, i guess author is the vital center, a book came out in the late 40s # and, early 50s.

he's one of the guys lost in history a little bit, but he's known to be a liberal, but conservative on certain things when it came to defense and talking about communism and trying to find ways in which both left and right can work together in winning the cold war. i suggest that, but letters to the young conservative and dan's conservative history of the american left. >> i meant to use this joke earlier, i'm probably the only person in the room who owns the book. if you walked into a liberal's office, it's in my office too. on a regular sort of a regular part of one's reading diet, it's good idea to read con seven rare liberal writes who have influence, and that's one example. i think actually she gives a very good window in why are men

necessary -- that's the name of her book -- and believe it or not, but i actually think it's insightful at moments or a little window into both left thinking on some of these social issues, but also frappingly the impact, the sexual revolution has had on the relationships between men and women, and she doesn't really have any solutions, but i think she sort of lays it there, and it's useful in that sense, so just generally, i would always look at -- when you look at the conservative -- the "new york times" best seller list, make sure you always had not just the sean hannity and others covered that are really influencing the

people who run our white house regularly right now. what's the other question? >> conservative. >> where would you start? right. where would you start. i think nsah is the -- nash is the answer as the professor says. i do think starting with -- starting with a bill buckley book is not -- it's just not -- any bill buckley book that sort of -- maybe not his mystery novels, but that's not giving an overview, but it does give a sense, frankly, that our movement is not just about politics, and, so, yeah, read a sailing book. >> opening up to student questions. we have a couple minutes. running short on time, but we have a couple minutes. >> while the first person is coming up, can someone send these around? these are book lists i prepared. >> and you get a free book.

>> you get a free book if you have the lucky gold star. >> let's take the first question. >> okay. this question is for a friend, and he wants to know for a conservative prelaw student, what book would you guys recommend for him? >> i would recommend probably a book by randy barnett who's a law professor at the cato constitute called "restoring our lost constitution." it's appropriate for a student. there's an older book called "economic liberties in the constitution," a great book on the constitution as well, and they both go through a lot of supreme court cases and varies interpretations of the constitution. >> you know, conservatives believe in the idea of the constitution as originally

conceived and that those ideas have strict instructionallism. roger mentioned the book before, but i'll say it again, "the law," and it's the best. for my class when talking about this topic, it's difficult to find literature about the ideas of originalism. there's a lot of legal books out there talking about it, but for mass con seemings, it's hard to -- consumption, it's hard to find. i asked the former attorney general under reagan to talk, and he said without a doubt, the law. there's a line from there that basically sums up this book which if i think hilts to the core of it. he talks about how life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. on the contrary. it's the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that cause men to make laws in the first place. it talks about the ideas of originalism and constructionallism. >> that might be the answer. >> mark levin, because i know

you're fans -- have you read the book called "men in black?" it's essentially about judicial tyranny and abuse and -- there you go -- and how the law has been abused, but being a lawyer, he lays out a lot of the frame work you're going 20 want, so i recommend that. i meant to do a little plug for contemporary books, and it's not about the constitution per se, but my room meat wrote a book called "the party of death." wow, you're prepared. i thought he was going to reach for -- it's about abortion politics, but large sections of it are about abortion and the constitution and how that's all played out, so i would very much recommend that as well. >> perfect. thank you.

>> hi, i'm from new hampshire. my question is what book do you want to recommend to sunts here in 20 years written by someone here in this room? what's the title of the book you want to recommend that we wrote? >> oh, i see. >> how we eliminated deficit and got government back to its proper functions. how's that? [laughter] [applause] >> how we saved america. >> i or vived -- i survived barak obama. [cheers and applause] >> i'm from houston, texas. this is off topic, but something i think you can give a good insight to. generally speaking, our education system and just to say

the last 30 years, sat scores plummeted even though the tests are dumbed down twice in 15 years, and that especially includes literacy and english ability. as a matter of fact, all you have to do is check your facebook or read youtube comments, and you know literacy is not at its peak. what's your insight of how to kind of give our education system or just generally speaking literacy a good boost and see if we can see a reversal of our decline of literacy? >> well, i guess i would say we need to reform our education system. we need choice and competition in education in our country. we need to promote alternatives like home schooling and tuition tax credits and things like that to encourage and enable parents to find places where they can

get a better education for their children. >> a side note on hollywood -- i get such a skewed view of hollywood, and when i got there because i'll meet people like all of andrew breitbart's friends and trying to influence the culture, not by making a documentary, but letting their conservative ideas because they read so many of the books rerecommended today and we heard and admire the speakers you heard and let it influence their jobs which is a great thing. to your question -- i hope this is a simple way -- or way too simple answer, but i think it's -- it's an effective answer. i would just promote literacy in our lives. we're conservatives. we don't want the federal government to come up with a solution for this. we want to read good books, know what good books are and give

them to family and friends., you know? when it's christmas time, give a book you read and make it mean something. i think that's a meaningful gift, but it promotes literacy. i think we don't do enough of that. we buy the perfect gift in a store. give them a book that you read out of this conference or whatever it is. i think that's the way to do it. >> whatever i assign papers in my class i'm scared to death of what i'll get back. sometimes i wish it was 160 characters or less of some of these. you know, there's simple things to do, little things that we can strive for. we have kind of loss this, but the idea that creative writing has a new means is free thought rather than structured photographs, outlines, basic grammar, reading it after it's done, spell check that's easily accessible these dais on any

word document. tweets, try to write out a word rather than using u, r, lmao, lol. yeah, little things like that. [laughter] ha-ha! [laughter] smiley face. any ways, just little things like that. i think there needs to be a focus. we've gone from the english creative writing, and we forgot the structure and order, and you don't have the be the greatest writer in the world, but do the basic outline, abc, paragraphs, basic grammar. sometimes the first paragraph scares me the most. if i can't understand your thesis in the first sentence or paragraph, i'm like dreading, dreading the next 30 pages. it's important when you write no matter what you do -- if you leave with anything from this

session -- write your thoughts out in the first seasons what it is you are trying to accomplish and they can pick and choose whether or not they want to read this. look at conservative blogs out there. brog writes a -- drudge writes a seasons, and if you don't like it, are you going to read it? no. capture them in the beginning. i strongly encourage you if you are writers interested in writing, write more. >> all right, thank you. [applause] >> awesome. [applause] >> well, thank you, panelists. we'll reconvene tonight for our dinner dinner with larry at 7:30 here in the grand ballroom. thank you all for coming. let's thank our panelists one more time. [cheers and applause] [inaudible conversations] >> this event was part of the annual young america's foundation national conservative student conference.