connecting the dots of things are able to, talk about in one short hour. thank you for being here tonight. >> there is a link that goes into the chat and i will that represents the team. hello ever'm

uvalde fan of the american enterprise institute and it is my pleasure to welcome you to this conversation >> hello everybody and welcome from aei is my pleasure to welcome you to this conversation about the excellent new book the 100 year war for american conservativism. and over the past century it takes up the ideas of the electoral coalition that has composed and the way and the book explores some important

tensions between populism and agconservative one —- conservativism and pragmatist in paris so it gives us a lot to talk about and that is what we will be doing this morning. and you might say and a thinker of politics on moderate as a senior fellow here at aei his work is focused on american politics and history and a prominent journalist and has the contributing editor for. >> and dealing with the evolution of the modern right.

serving in congress through 2019 representing the first district of wisconsin and in that time serving as a budget committee and ways and means committee and serving as speaker for three and half years. sos. but the format is straightforward in conversational no opening statements. we will discuss and after some back-and-forthp which i will moderate we will open for questions. you can ask by e-mail or by

twitter. if you are on twitter use #aei the right. because that was an important andks superb book. one way to get a sense is by telling us why you voted and why you wrote it in the way that you did? and has that particular character in form? >> thanknd you for but then many years in the making the this book and you said you have to write the book. you are able to help me on —- aei. i >> first i love reading old

journalism. is starting off as a political writer 20 years ago, my hobby was reading to eat archives where i worked and then moving to the o archives of americans spectator, commentary magazine all of these little magazines on the american right it was an education of the history of the american politics and culture. really that's i've been doing over to take because more than the 2012 election and beyond

that republican party and the various factions with the ideas and principles and also carrying through 2012 the populist moment i believe began in the second bush administration around 2006 and only gaining steam. so i i wanted to investigate what was happening and what was driving the energy and when donald trump came down that is later but the history of the 90 figure how we reached this impasse. the sinia is that i have been teaching this material in some

form over the years. some of my students are here and i'm happy to see that but there was no one volume textbook i could just say this is the history. there is somek great work this is the key text of my feet but with the post-world war ii conservative movement but also around the late seventies. myself what - - broadened the story and tell in a narrative format so one —- so this way i could just hand it to my student read this book. iie am biased.

but the question of the right so why do they care about the history but then if we lose what the country is all about and for me and then to be put through in the policies that you potential. if we lose that the mailings that are left and we become like other countries. and other democracies. it is extremely important we are but there's a lot we have

to do before we can do that. why is it important? so that we can make sure that the 21st century is the great american century. democracy and self-determination his and that so i could breathe. [laughter] but we were talking about this when i age and as a young person with the think tank is a member you had a day but for

union young people who are shocked at this infighting of the conservative movement, this is whatso happens. is you have a reagan type of person you how that fighting. but that becomes the majority movement so we can fluctuate policy and then saw this - - with these problems. >> it must be a challenge. and post-world war ii phenomenon. and you put a o lot of emphasis on the prewar rights beginning in 1920s.

so the two hardest questions is where to begin and then to criticize b if with the warren harding an occupation quick. >> it was important to show the institutions that american conservatives saw themselves defending. if that is a defense, american conservatives are in the unusual place. the institutions we are meant to defend t are created by the american founding the institution in the principles of the declaration of independence but in 1932 many

people on the right believe a revolution a taken place and that they, the people on the right were defending inherited institutionsns on against the new deal so i thought it was important to show how they came to define themselves in opposition. prior progressivism was settle in the american political continuum was still very much up for grabs. teddy roosevelt but of course he was a very successful republican president. maybe not in some ways and not until we will find ourselves

of normalcy andnd the gop is extraordinarily successful. but but looking at the policy and not the intervention to the eyes of america. so those i conservatives had to reconfigure itself for the post-world war ii cold war era. i wanted to incorporate that

story but the kind of work you are most engaged, the shoot the attempt to restore pre- new deal america. is there some truth? is the american right still seeking some way to recover i guess but i would call the social contract that issue

cuts against us. i don't think that is the case anymore whether choice or individualism or not. if you are a progressive this is a way to extend coverage i to think it misrepresented itself between new deal in areas and they did not

bankrupt the country but using market and choice and competition as a means to deliver on these goals but it became clear no way he would embrace that other than making good on a promise which for me in his mind and that was always frustrating to me that it gives yous an example of where the right is now. either we reform it until but

which is responding to? f the right always felt on the but i was struck whenever i teach the founding documents at national review, the longest was launched in 1955. williamy. buckley junior who is essential protagonist that says conservatives who are against the new deal and in parentheses if we are not sure if there can be any other

kind. [laughter] >> for an american on the right to read that too partisan say clearly i think that change. the passage of time and the small see conservative we don't want to rock about. but also the left has changed and the left has moved on to new territory. in many ways we are not fighting over the newme deal so much as the cultural agenda of the left which comes out of the antiwar and counterculture movements of the sixties and. >> that means build buckley in your book that is case may be put reagan on the cover.

so what was william f buckley doing? what was the purpose? and if you think of national review and this project starting in the fifties what was his ambition? >> at that young age when he comes on the scene in 1951 he is 26 years old. and he said this to mike wallace in early interview on a counterrevolutionary and what he wanted to overturn is fdr's revolution of the social contract launched and how did he go about doing this? there were many different avenues he pursued the first was institution building in addition to national review alsoe responsible to play a

part of the intercollegiate studies so for freedom all of which continue to this day and also launching magazines. he did it in terms of trying to build up a counter establishment. tod recruit people to make conservative arguments but who would be treated seriously by everyday americans but the big problem in the aftermath of

world war ii of the post- mccarthy period through the night on —- mid- but that constitution and bill of rights are liberal documents and these conservatives who after all part berkeley was it seems a little bit odd. the intellectual ties in the idea of government expansion and regulation milton friedman but then to make it a spectacle so he began to draw fences around his version ofis american conservativism and going after anti-semitism.

libertarian he was the narco capitalist national security played a big part in this them but please conservativism was one of engage nationalism and america should be strong and powerful and defend itself but had to be engaged in the world that meant a standing army, for defense and affirmative hours and then to be extremely skeptical and not outright

opposed this is a version of the american conservativism that build buckley created. the last part of his legacy that playing in the draft goldwater campaigns. but that political energy

expenses often theat early friendship with ronald reagan that then in order to get rid of so i studied in college friedman anger up reading bob bartley's pages. and then i will give you my copy when i am done with it. [laughter] and i consumed it. so so we have different

movements like this when people come of age. i think bessie but he was the center of gravity and if reagan wasn't on the cover then exactly. >> of all the debates we are having at the moment but also to build up the infrastructure to compete with the conservative infrastructure

and then over this new right for many years but in the final years of the trump presidency in the years subsequent they are building their own infrastructure. just shows you the importance of institution. because with the and writing about who was in their basement but it would be in the old right that presented itself as a within those institutions there was a

dividing line so that blinded the roof coldfusion is him so beginning in the sixties. >> tell us what should ask communist to convert it to the right with his book the road to serfdom and was a contributor to many of the right winning journals and

then became associated with national review a senior editor. and he had been trained in timeliness and we used to call them air traffic control to make sure planes are going in the right direction and day so than the american defense

establishment whether a standing army or weapons programs and what the conservatives desired a policy of a lack of communism including military intervention was necessary.

that begins with an insult. it's one of those words.

but those that national review said you could even if it didn't work out in theory, it was revealed

but then to build that coalition and a working majority in congress, it requires but then they have to coexistns with that coalition those that come from different philosophies and backgrounds within the confines of the conservative movement where you have to fuse these together. so fusion isse a mess and trial

toal have practical majorities to pass laws. 's amended think tank it's hard to rationalize that when you are affecting politics and practicing politics it becomes essential. >> the coalition built around the notion took shape through the sixties and in the seventies when they experience an extremely difficult decade in a s lot of ways. the story you tell in this book is extraordinary vibrancy. stepping back the seventies think like most important decade of the ten that you describe in the development of ithe right. what happened to the right in the seventies? how is it different coming out then going into them?

>> the simplest answer is that new groups came to be associated with the right and the americann conservative movement and a lot of that played out as a result of the overreach of liberalism and the radical left during the vietnam era and the student rebellion and the social turbulence of the sixties and seventies people who did not identify being on the right coming into an alliance with the american conservatives so it became a question of how american conservativism would deal with these new entrants. bill gavin who was a tispeechwriter for nixon called streetcorner conservatives they were not familiar with

hayek orrk russell kirk the great traditionalist author but in fact often they were democrats they were part of the fdr majority coalition but it in the late sixties early seventies they looked and said what is happening to my country? rising crime, rising drug abuse dissolution of dissolving iefamilies, democratic party wrapped over vietnam and the new rights so they are moving into the republican column. they come to be known as the hardhats because they tend to be blue-collar. not having a college degree. the hardhats into the republican coalition critical

of next landslide win in 72 and become part of the right over the years. they are the reagan democrats they swerved word ross perot back newt gingrich brings them back in 1984 they are the trump silent majority. another group that comes in the seventies and these are the neoconservatives liberal anti-communist who for the same reasons as the hardhats found themselves out of sync with the democratic party and those on the left not all make migrations when irving kristol endorses nixon in 72 it is a scandal and many don't make the jump to the republican

party until well into the eighties but these neoconservative intellectuals who are often well-positioned are now migrating to the right so how do these neocons fit into the pitcher? i remember in spring of 71 responding to commentary magazines and the title of the editorial was, and the water is fine. [laughter] so they are welcoming then in and bringing in the neocons. finally the last group is the religious right it was dormant in many ways at the national

political level like it is because the federal decisions and judicial rulings in the seventies and because of disappointment presidency of carter you see the questions move from the democratic party into the republican column. the american right looks very different now has the hardhats and the neoconservatives and the religious right as well. which really reinvigorated with pain and suffering and as

the editorial pages they really reinvigorated and then he became a convert with jack kemp. but that really reinvigorated that economic message to unify people. >> what do supply-siders say? >> frankly it was the 3 percent rule and also those who were a because nixon took us off of the gold standard and there is a big monetary policy fight that we never really had before so you had

supply-siders bringing answers to the problem of inflation and with tax reform to achieve economic growth and to really show how you could have growth and opportunity and to bring the agenda which the wisconsin guy and jack kemp in 1978 and then in 1981 pass the tax cut showing where real growth looks like actually jack kennedy got that started. that we wanted to have fresh evidence of our ideas because we're all coasting on the fumes of the reagan revolution that was achieving higher

income ability more wage workers with faster wage growth opportunity was occurring because of supply-side economics so we put it back in place and actually got fresh evidence it does work through a curveball but i would say the supply-side movement is a debate within the establishment of the republican party where supply-siders prevailed and that really helped stitch this together in my opinion. >> so the strands of the seventies it is a strange combination of ideas really has brought together ultimately by ronald reagan in the striking thing is it doesn't really culminate a lot of histories of the right build up to ronald reagan and then down to say like how far

we have come down. that's not the argument that you make so how do you explain ronald reagan what did he do? >> and to be commissioned by reagan himself it depends where you open that up but then to have no idea what was going on behind that's my also as a fictional character to bring out the person. i don't thinkag anyone penetrated that smile they said nancy reagan did but i'm

not so sure. and always on stage. very consistent over the decades but she interviews him and ron and what he thinks of american exceptionalism in 1947 is almost word for word he says in his farewell address very literal and the basic belief system.

i think. >> he doesn't become a republican until he is 51 years old. he votes for fdr four times that he has in his said what america was like. but here but showing how americanas should live. that was in the zone. and a few other things. so this is something he picked up from fdr. and i get reagan's and with

the rendezvous with destiny. it is you and me having a conversation and that orientation to the future is unusual as a conservative i look to the past and here is reagan who was thinking about the future. then finally some characteristics to make reagan stand out in the pantheon of the american right. one person who i really enjoyed writing about is senator taft who was mr. republican representative of the pre-world war ii into the nato after the war but taft ran unsuccessfully for the republicanst nomination would be the first to tell you he was not the most charismatic person and conservatives do have a

tendency to be dour or pessimistic or the four is reagan from anything. so this also makes him unusual and to parts of the electorate when they hear that dave flinch they think neanderthal andha caveman. >> i live about 80 miles upstream and the reason i

mention that is because where i came from this guy down river that just became president, this is amazing and it brought people into looking at as an irish catholic family, it was the entrée into why this is about? a lot of people where i came from inas wisconsin, he was the entry and he had such a great face and way about him he was invitingk people who never looked at it before to look at it that's why he is such an amazing intersection of time and why r the fusion that occurred with the reagan coalition came together because of the unique personality and that is extremely where. >> he also had a monopoly with reagan departure and 89 then post presidency cut short because of alzheimer's

diagnosis in 1984. and buckley really stretched out his retirement first retired from public speaking and then the board but he never retired from but then to lose these figures so certainly every faction within american conservativism and the movement saw that as unifying so that conflictual nature comes forward. >> you enter the political world right after reagan. where does the rights think it was headed?

i was sad think tank called empower america the heads of the three different movements working with people so i never thought of myself as much as a neocon but is much as a supply-side or. and we were fighting at times which was that beginning a little bit of ross perot and it is funny and guys like that at thean national review it wasn't the weekly standard yet but the neocons fighting the paleo kinds and that point to being when it ended with the

defeat of h.w. bush by clinton attend of soul-searching was going on inn the conservative movement turned inward and shot at each other but not until the standardbearer emerged but then that's a cold and never really took place a solid fusion because of circumstances but in the post- reagan era we were with an internal struggle and i think we still are frankly we have one some white houses but we never settled into a posture that is capable of racking up

consistentie majorities and putting in place the agenda from the 21st century right now it's dominated by trump kit's populism and the cult of personality populism so underneath that is the early nineties the same fight as right now with digital. >> your book describes post- reagan riots and as the exception there is a way as populism rose to the forefront in the 1990s and the time when the populism held became the

face ofnt the right in response to clinton how do you think of the years? >> and there isns that relationship and the irony that often times the only way conservatives get into power is through populist politics and we are conflicted but this is clearly evidentne in the reagan election to be one of the driving forces to synthesize populism with the supply-side agenda and the interest of the religious right and the defense buildup. and i all thought it was very

interesting the 1988 gop primary was a missed opportunity because there is a moment with the republican party could have been forced to choose between jack kemp does it run for president he waits because he recognizes that reagan successor will be george h.w. bush he is an establishment republican so to get in a fight between the establishment republican and buchanan in 1982 but the attitude toward war and beginning in the 96 campaign picking up the trade issue as well. so that debate is had but in

2000 and runsn for the reform take it. and they think is the first recognized 16 years later trump ascends to the presidency on many ideas so at the moment with the forces of populism and that conservative governing class coming to power with ronald reagan with the first george bush moving up to capitol hill during the republican revolution and then came back downeo pennsylvania avenue with george w. bush and

that has been displaced. >> and the majority and when obama came in. but our goales was to recruit members of congress. and then we ended up the local county executive or stated senator. and a lazy we got fat and happy with earmarks and it was ugly.

we lose the majority this was 2006 and then we recruited people much would have been a lot of votesta and we were excited and that tea party movement at what is our chance to get supply-side two.zero. so to be agnostic but two.zero is not it is progrowth economics, limited government and there was a fight that we push that aside so we really couldn't effectuate p much but.

>> in retrospect is that what it was? >> there was a little bit of a fight with the neocons supply-side. to not understand the potency of those issues where you could see signs of this above the establishment republicans so the effects of issues of immigration on the forgotten man. and with the tea party movement what the supply-side feel that they agree with national defense so that is it like it is now at that time.

ended up happening is they overtook the movement and it morphed into what it is today. so there was a moment in time we really thought we had a shot finallywh majorities people freaked t out. so people really freaked out but then what happened from my perspective i'm not having these nice guys no more nice guy. just send the philosopher after. and then with the digital age with cable so the entertainer replaced those and the country

and the reactionary moment through the best entertainer finishing second in the race. >> and remember ben carson? >> and it testifies the importance of the 2012 election. >> so the world would be a very different place. but i agree that 2012 was a hinge that many people on the right had internalized the

idea because of american exceptionalism barack obama had to be jimmy carter reborn and could only be one term because he was so interested in moving america in a direction where it had not gone for many years so his ambition was to be thea progressive reagan and to change politics so they really believe this was going to be waterloo. this wasio the battle so when they called so early in the evening by the 11:00 o'clock news s i think many people on the right were stunned. [laughter] >> i can imagine.

and that made them say, all right. if we are reaching this point with the electoral input we elect scott around me have the tea party congress that they are not able to do anything but then wehe get republican wave again that captures the senate and in 2014 obama says i heard they voted republicans in congress but also those who voted for democrats and i will govern to those people but the election should matter and that drove a lot of people on the right that we need ant' external force to shake up the system. that's the only way we can achieve any of our goals. and they got it.

>> you mentioned three issues immigration, war, trade. that's where things broke open when they said this isn't working. and that seeming consensus in the bush years was an illusion. >> if it was an illusion it should have been apparent even at the time and as a reporter i was covering immigration edebates working where they were very supportive of the comprehensionbu reform but to say no way that would happen because even if it passed the

senate the republicans in the house would not allow that. so that's when you begin to see the grassroots right and those establishments in washington. so for a while they stood behind the republican president who was launch for beginning in 2007 with the rise of ron paul you see that there is discontent on the right. but protectionism is more complicated so what trump did against the tpp or the transpacific partnership was

provide them for those depths of despair that were ravaging america. alcoholism, opioid crisis. unimaginable social crisis. he said into the wto. whether that is true is an empirical question. but politically and speaking to the shrewdness easiest similar thing with immigration a complicated issue simply that conservatives opposed. but what happened with the rise of isis with the jv team

trump proposes the muslim then to take immigration and combine it and then we have to those who are searching for jobs or to make america safe. you can see that he can put these issues together in 2016 something they're not able to do in 2020. >> is time for questions.

>> one reason we have these discussions it is apparent the small government conservative and is toxic now. there are 18 of us working on this project. i thank you have to reconcile with the life of the programs. had you know about achieving those and the best way to

maximize limited government in economy? once we have a social contract we all agree should exist the task make them perform the best and then they want government to run it all and commando of resources. they want to use it as an extension and then to give these services to reach consensus. that may sound like me but it is radical pragmatism.

and we don't lose the reserve currencies because of that happens withha the social contract if we go down that path we lose the reserve currency and then you have a total that crisis real-time surgery in real-time and real life so that's what would happen if we basically do nothing. 's you have to step ahead of this and when majorities and you have to have a president willing to stick their neck out that's the key task for the conservative movement right now.

>> you made a passingr reference to the iraq war so where the republican soured on that a very powerful moment in the 16 campaign when donald trump and where he eviscerated that in a passionate way i thought it was a cheap shot but his history was spot on and would resonate when he felt that was soured upon republican voters? >> itse is a complicated question because public opinion began to turn after the bombing of the mosque with the onset of civil war really

begins spinning out of control and public opinion is ambivalent about sending more troops and changing our strategy but yet mccain and romney engaged in a debate over the surge of a run-up to the primaries incc 2000 day and it's a debate that achieving stability to allow us is still powerful among republicans. however what i think was going on when he attacked jeb bush iraq was part of it but it was much more. is more about ending the bush era turning a page on the bush

era. think of the condition in 2015 clearly ending at two-term presidency and the situation overseas at that point domestically is not good period who doll the two parties offer? jeb bush and hillary clinton. [laughter] another sign on to the bush dynasty you cannot get more establishment and hillary clinton on the left. so he is basically saying bush is over there is still huge discontent with comprehensive immigration reform which jeb bush had written a book about and the bushed presidency at the

global financial crisis and also in the back of voters heads. it is not trumps victory in the republican primary. having lost the general election and that debate between populism and conservativism for 100 years. and it turned out as a fluke the 30000 in a few states as you like world college victory

what you are the president you're the most famous and theth most important person in the road maybe next to the fed chair. [laughter] and then to set an example.at so it's not that he won the nomination of a consequence but trump winning the presidency and being presidentra for four years to transform the conservative movement and republican party. >> our time is drawing to a close. so with the future of the right. with the past hundred years and what does the future look like?

>> i would say that it's very important that american conservativism remember that it is american what makes them distinct takes them to the american founding in american political institution. and we worry sometimes it is drawn to thoses of continental europe. it is not american right and even though i think that the terrain of politics has shifted from an argument over the size and scope of government of the cultural power the policy mayle be leveraged. and then the right to be

something very different from the 100 years i write about. also you cannot sustain a political coalition that attract nonpolitical everyday americans who are looking to substitute answers. >> . >> and then the european flavor populism on the right disregards the uniqueness of

american idea based on natural law and there are reasons for that but to me it is extremely important that conservative movement gets back to the critical institutions so you have a core standard on which you operate and then to have great debates on policy matters with the sphere of these principles. we won't get to that point until you have a party or movement capable of having a strong vibrant debate not just one personality. so this kind of populism we can get there and i think we well but those that have the vibrant debate but frankly from the economic standpoint le't

and paul ryan. thank you. thanks for writing. welcome to our viewers. my name is ken rogoff. i'm a professor at harvard university and i'm here today to