Ten books every conservative should read

by Gene Wisdom, reposted July 23, 2022, Originally posted Oct. 2, 2017 - As a conservative reader and student of this outlook called conservatism I have developed a passion for helping others to “turn that light on”, to make that discovery of a set of ideas that would bring them perfect understanding, intellectual nirvana, of our political world.  No, no, not a grasp of political strategy and the correct stance between RINO’s and Tea Partiers, and how insiders operate.  Not even a policy guide presents a checklist of the issues important for conservative voters. 

 First published in 1976, and revised in 1996,
George H. Nash’s celebrated history of the postwar
conservative intellectual movement has become
the unquestioned standard in the field. This new
edition, published in commemoration of the volume’s
thirtieth anniversary includes a new preface by Nash
 and will continue to instruct anyone interested in
how today’s conservative movement was born.
(Amazon link)

No, I’ve long believed that as conservatives we need, we require, a better understanding of the ground beneath our positions.  Because I believe that conservatives are rooted both in the truth and in the knowledge that there is truth, we should hunger for it to feed our minds, to secure us to the ground and thereby protect ourselves from liberal flights of fancy.

So my friend Rod Williams tasked me to do what I’ve been tumbling around in my head for several years: present a list of the top ten books for conservatives.  I’ve got to admit, I had to kind of round out the group as the first three or so were automatic, works that I have been repeatedly sharing on Facebook and with friends, urging “Conservatives, you must read this!” 

Number one, then, is the one I have probably most worn a groove in my Facebook timeline with, The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America Since 1945, by George H. Nash.  It is no exaggeration to declare that it is the place to start for anyone who wants to understand conservatism and who seeks to grasp the roots and foundations of modern conservative thought.  Nash explores the three-legged stool of conservatism: libertarianism, traditionalism, and anti-Communism.  And no, these legs aren’t simply marijuana legalization, the Christian right, and kill-a-commie-for-mommy.  He examines the postwar thinkers behind each of those elements and those, like William F. Buckley, who sought to bring their often disparate ideas together into a movement. 

(Amazon link)

Another standout is the second one on my list, James Burnham’s Suicide of the West: An Essay on the Meaning and Destiny of Liberalism.  While I believe that conservatives must be grounded in conservatism as a set of ideas and must understand their philosophical history and roots, I am convinced that we should no less seek to understand our opponent in the realm of ideas, modern liberalism.  Burnham investigates key areas such as the liberal’s view of human nature, the liberal order of values, their attachment to universalism and internationalism, their devotion to equality, and their sense of guilt.  If we do not understand the bases of their beliefs we WILL NOT understand where they seek to take us. 

A particular longstanding favorite is Men and Marriage, by George Gilder, described back in the day as Ronald Reagan’s “intellectual guru” for his landmark book, Wealth and Poverty.  For me, a key insight is Gilder’s exploration of the fact that marriage civilizes men.  He argues that single men are the bane of civilization for the destructive—and self-destructive—influences and impulses they wield in society. 

A companion that must be mentioned with Gilder’s work is Charles Murray’s blockbuster Losing Ground: American Social Policy 1950-1980.  This book is often credited as being the inspiration behind the “Clinton welfare reform” (actually the Republican welfare reform that Clinton vetoed several times before finally signing it) and its premise is that welfare policy has been a miserable failure, that the War on Poverty became instead a war on families.  He builds on Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s insight from two decades earlier, that the War on Poverty contributed to the dissolution of black families in the United States and was beginning to have the same impact on white families while expanding its destruction to blacks.  By the way, Murray carries forward and expands his contributions in his recent Coming Apart: The State of White America 1960-2010. 

Because it embodies so many of the truths of conservatism our American Constitution is rightfully honored by people of various stripes on the Right and it embodies both the love of liberty and the rich history and tradition of our British forbears.  In order to understand its principles and protections we properly look to the period of its writing to understand the Framers.  

In my opinion, one of the best sources on the struggle to ratify the Constitution, a controversy which should shape how we view its provisions, is Library of America’s two-volume, The Debate on the Constitution, a collection of both Federalist and anti-Federalist arguments, for and against the Constitution, including several of Publius’s writings in The Federalist Papers.  Here I’ll throw in what I believe is another indispensable read and a reference.  In my opinion, many conservatives and liberals err in understanding what our Founders were seeking to hammer out, misunderstanding that could be allayed by simply reading James Madison’s Notes on the Convention.  James Madison was present every day of the Federal Convention and took copious notes of the proposals, debates, and votes.  

A reference that belongs on the shelves of every student of the Constitution is Liberty Fund’s The Founders Constitution, a 5-volume oversize collection of writings that both informed the Founders and contemporary understandings, and does so, clause by clause for the Constitution and the first twelve amendments. 

Rounding out the gotta have’s is a primer, and so a placeholder for an explication of its principles, Economics in One Lesson, by Henry Hazlitt, that timeless work on free-market economics.  We all laugh about how little liberals understand about the basics of economics.  But how much do we know?  One of the three legs of the conservative stool, as Nash detailed, is libertarianism.  And there is nothing in libertarianism that is built on so rigorous and studied a system as the principles of the Austrian school of economics, developed by Carl Menger, Eugen Bohm-Bawerk, Ludwig von Mises, and Friedrich Hayek.  Modern libertarianism has degenerated, due to some unfortunate influences from the 60’s, into a hippie “if it feels good, do it and keep the government’s hands off me” and has largely left behind these pillars.  I doubt if more than a handful of my libertarian friends has read one of those classics, even Hazlitt’s introduction. 

And, speaking of Hayek and being forgotten by modern libertarians.  Another work that merits top-shelf consideration for any conservative is Hayek’s The Mirage of Social Justice, which is the second volume of his 3-volume Law, Legislation, and Liberty.  The centrality of that concept in the lexicon of modern liberalism (and thereby into modern political policy discussions) merits the place of this work for modern conservatives.  Hayek lays bare the utter meaninglessness of the concept and crumbles one of modern liberalism’s fundamentals.  Not a small contribution from someone who in another essay explained “Why I Am Not a Conservative” and contributed so many other major works to our understanding, including The Road to Serfdom, The Constitution of Liberty, and The Counter-Revolution of Science. 

The attack of the cultural Left on morality and Western civilization has required the shoring up of our philosophical foundations.  This became clear to me as I began to explore natural law (Thomas Jefferson’s “laws of nature and of nature’s God”) as the underpinning, the philosophical roots, of conservatism, of society.  For myself, that study began with the reading of Heinrich Rommen’s The Natural Law, which provided a basic understanding of both the concept and its philosophical history.  This opened the door to such modern natural law scholars as Robert George (whom the New York Times called America’s “most influential conservative Christian thinker”), J. Budziszewski, and Hadley Arkes.  Start with Rommen, though. 

The next book is really more of a genre than a single work.  And I almost left it out of this listing.  One of the three legs of the conservative stool identified by George Nash is anti-Communism.  As an element of the movement it was the unifier that often bridged the warring divide between libertarians and traditionalists.  There is a long list of go-to books for understanding the subversive influence of Communism in America.  The first two I would suggest are legendary FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover’s Masters of Deceit and You Can Trust the Communists (to be Communists) by the Founder of the Christian Anti-Communist Crusade, Frederick Schwarz.  One corrective to the historical smears that make up liberal revisionism is Perjury: The Hiss-Chambers Case by Allen Weinstein.  In this blockbuster, Weinstein set out to prove Alger Hiss was not a Soviet spy and wound up making the definitive case for Hiss’s guilt. Another is Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America’s Enemies, by M. Stanton Evans, an icon of the conservative movement.  There are easily a dozen other books that recommend themselves in this area. 

The reason I almost left these in history’s dustbin is that modern conservatives have seemingly forgotten that there is true evil in the modern world.  The evil of Communism is one of the “gifts of the Left” and is part of the poisoned progeny of Jean Jacques Rousseau.  It is therefore the ideological cousin of modern liberalism and that kinship explains why Burnham in Suicide of the West found that, for modern liberalism, there are no enemies to the Left.  While Communists were often contemptuous of their cousins as “useful idiots”, liberals seem to have a warm spot in their hearts for their murderous kin.  I also fear that modern libertarianism shares some traits with liberalism, viz, a belief that human nature is good, an attachment to rationalism over traditionalism, and the hyper-rationalists’ over-confidence in the ability to remake society on these bases. 

As starting points for a couple of social conservative issues (issues because the Left’s agenda has forced them on us and not even through democratic means), the best place to start, to learn the best grounding for the pro-life/anti-abortion position is Francis Beckwith’s Politically Correct Death: Answering the Arguments for Abortion Rights.  Though the title is rather emotionally-charged this book lays out in very clear and logical terms the scientific/medical arguments against abortion.  A close second in this category is The Moral Question of Abortion by Stephen Schwarz. 

The other issue of the day for social conservatives is of course the attack on the institution of marriage posed by the push to legitimize same-sex marriage.  While there are other works on this subject, the author to look for is Ryan Anderson, who has become the go-to expert in presenting these arguments for preserving this core institution of Western civilization.  Anderson was a force of one around the country and often cited, including by Justice Alito in his dissent in the recent Obergefell v. Hodges U.S. Supreme Court decision, by proponents of preserving this institution.  Anderson’s first book on this issue, as one of three co-authors, was What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense, which began as an article for The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, a Federalist Society online publication.  His second is a compelling critique of that decision, Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom, which explores the ramifications for our First Amendment liberties. 

OK, like the dessert list, I couldn’t limit myself.  There are probably a few more than ten above but I believe they make a good starting point for anyone seeking to better understand the political thought of the Right.  As I suggested earlier, there are different elements of conservatism and in fact it can be broken down further than the three listed in Nash’s history.  And neoconservatism and the New Right were barely making their appearance when his book first appeared and so he added them in a later edition.  

Gene Wisdom, a retired naval officer, is a lifelong conservative Republican and is active in local conservative organizations.  He is a native Alabamian but has lived in the Nashville area since 2007.  He formerly moderated the monthly Conservative Fusion Book Club. 

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Is America 'Coming Apart' at the seams? Join the discussion

Charles Murray is a political scientist and a self-described libertarian. In Coming Apart he argues that current American social classes are fundamentally different from anything we have know before in America, arguing that at one time, rich and poor shared basic standards of  behavior and values but that that is no longer true. He draws on five decades of statistics and research to support his argument. To remove the variable of race and ethnicity from the discussion, he focuses on White America.

Coming Apart is the selection of the next meeting of the Conservative Fusion Book Club. You can get a copy of the book for less than $5 at Amazon. The meeting will be Wednesday, November 13th at the home of Gene Wisdom at 7PM. For directions email Gene at hvillenavy@yahoo.com. 

Charles Murray first became well known for his Losing Ground: American Social Policy 1950–1980 in 1984, which discussed the American welfare system. Murray has also written In Pursuit: Of Happiness and Good Government (1988), What It Means to be a Libertarian: A Personal Interpretation (1996), Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. to 1950 (2003), and In Our Hands: A Plan to Replace the Welfare State (2006). He published Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality in 2008. He has also been widely published in conservative, libertarian and mainstream media. He is a scholar at American Enterprise Institute.

Please join us for this lively discussion of an important work.

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"Coming Apart by Charles Murray is the next selection of Conservative Fusion book study

The next meeting of Conservative Fusion will be Oct. 2. There is still time to get and read the book. Join us.

From Amazon description:

In Coming Apart, Charles Murray explores the formation of American classes that are different in kind from anything we have ever known, focusing on whites as a way of driving home the fact that the trends he describes do not break along lines of race or ethnicity.

Drawing on five decades of statistics and research, Coming Apart demonstrates that a new upper class and a new lower class have diverged so far in core behaviors and values that they barely recognize their underlying American kinship—divergence that has nothing to do with income inequality and that has grown during good economic times and bad.  

The top and bottom of white America increasingly live in different cultures, Murray argues, with the powerful upper class living in enclaves surrounded by their own kind, ignorant about life in mainstream America, and the lower class suffering from erosions of family and community life that strike at the heart of the pursuit of happiness. That divergence puts the success of the American project at risk.  

The evidence in Coming Apart is about white America. Its message is about all of America.

From Amazon review by author Niall Ferguson:

Since the advent of "Occupy Wall Street," there has been a tendency to assume that only the Left worries about inequality in America. Charles Murray's Coming Apart shows that conservatives, too, need to be concerned.

This is an immensely important and utterly gripping book. It deserves to be as much talked about as Murray's most controversial work (co-authored with Richard J. Herrnstein), The Bell Curve. Quite unjustly, that book was anathematized as "racist" because it pointed out that, on average, African-Americans had lower IQ scores than white Americans.

No doubt the same politically correct critics will complain about this book, because it is almost entirely devoted to the problem of social polarization within "white America." They will have to ignore one of Coming Apart's most surprising findings: that race is not a significant determinant of social polarization in today's America. It is class that really matters.

Murray meticulously chronicles and measures the emergence of two wholly distinct classes: a new upper class, first identified in The Bell Curve as "the cognitive elite," and a new "lower class," which he is too polite to give a name. And he vividly localizes his argument by imagining two emblematic communities: Belmont, where everyone has at least one college degree, and Fishtown, where no one has any. (Read: Tonyville and Trashtown.)

The key point is that the four great social trends of the past half-century--the decline of marriage, of the work ethic, of respect for the law and of religious observance--have affected Fishtown much more than Belmont. As a consequence, the traditional bonds of civil society have atrophied in Fishtown. And that, Murray concludes, is why people there are so very unhappy--and dysfunctional.

What can be done to reunite these two classes? Murray is dismissive of the standard liberal prescription of higher taxes on the rich and higher spending on the poor. As he points out, there could hardly be a worse moment to try to import the European welfare state, just as that system suffers fiscal collapse in its continent of origin. What the country needs is not an even larger federal government but a kind of civic Great Awakening--a return to the republic's original foundations of family, vocation, community, and faith.

Coming Apart is a model of rigorous sociological inquiry, yet it is also highly readable. After the chronic incoherence of Occupy Wall Street, it comes as a blessed relief. Every American should read it. Too bad only the cognitive elite will.

From Gene Wisdom, My own thoughts:
Charles Murray is the author of Losing Ground: American Social Policy 1950-1980 which was a blockbuster critique of the social destruction by and miserable failure, by its own declared goals, of the welfare state. This book seems to be an extension of the consequences of the unwillingness to "get it", to see that the welfare state is tearing down the fabric of American society, the family and the work ethic. I am looking forward to reading and discussing it and I hope you will join us.

To RSVP visit the  Facebook page: Conservative Fusion

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Conservative Fusion meets tonight and the next selection announced

Tonight is the meeting of the Conservative Fusion Book Study Group. The book is The Perfectibility of Man by John Passmore. You can get if free online at this link. If you didn't finish the book, read the last two pages of each chapter and come on.

For more information about the group go to Conservative Fusion on Facebook.

The next selection is The Natural Law: A Study in Legal and Social History and Philosophy, by Heinrich Rommen. Below is a summary of the book:

Originally published in German in 1936, The Natural Law is the first work to clarify the differences between traditional natural law as represented in the writings of Cicero, Aquinas, and Hooker and the revolutionary doctrines of natural rights espoused by Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau. Beginning with the legacies of Greek and Roman life and thought, Rommen traces the natural law tradition to its displacement by legal positivism and concludes with what the author calls “the reappearance” of natural law thought in more recent times. In seven chapters each Rommen explores “The History of the Idea of Natural Law” and “The Philosophy and Content of the Natural Law.” In his introduction, Russell Hittinger places Rommen’s work in the context of contemporary debate on the relevance of natural law to philosophical inquiry and constitutional interpretation.

This book is also available free online at this link. The next meeting will be August 21.

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John Passmore's The Perfectibility of Man is available on-line for free at this link.

John Passmore's The Perfectibility of Man is available on-line for free at this link.

One of the basic differences between liberals and conservatives is their view of the nature of man. This book explores the concept of the perfectibility of man and how it has been interpreted and applied. Below is a summary of the topic of the book.

A reviewer of the original edition in 1970 of The Perfectibility of Man well summarizes the scope and significance of this renowned work by one of the leading philosophers of the twentieth century: “Beginning with an analytic discussion of the various ways in which perfectibility has been interpreted, Professor Passmore traces its long history from the Greeks to the present day, by way of Christianity, orthodox and heterodox, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, anarchism, utopias, communism, psychoanalysis, and evolutionary theories of man and society. Both in its broad sweep and in countless supporting reflections, it is a journey through spiritual scenery of the most majestic and exhilarating kind.” Thoroughly and elegantly, Passmore explores the history of the idea of perfectibility - manifest in the ideology of perfectibilism - and its consequences, which have invariably been catastrophic for individual liberty and responsibility in private, social, economic, and political life.

Conservative Fusion Book Study group will be discussing this work at the July 17 meeting at 7PM. Read the book for free and join the discussion. For location contact Gene Wisdom at this address.

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The Perfectibility of Man is next Conservative Fusion selection, June 17

From Gene Wisdom organizer of The Conservative Fusion Book Study:

The next meeting of the Conservative Fusion Book Study will be June 17th at 7PM. For location, log in at the facebook site to receive notification or email Gene Wisdom.  

One of the core differences between conservatism and liberalism is in their views of the nature of man. Along with a view in the goodness of man, liberals tend to also believe in the mutability of the nature of man, that they, using the power of government, can mold and improve man's nature. Passmore's analysis looks at the history of that idea. It is my hope and goal that by better understanding the grounding of our opposing mindset, that of liberalism, we become stronger and better-informed conservatives. The book is published by Liberty Fund and can be purchased there (at www.libertyfund.org, click on Books, search from there) or at Amazon.com.

This Nashville-area Conservative Fusion group is dedicated to meeting and discussing, from a conservative, libertarian, or Constitutionalist perspective, ideas of public policy, political philosophy/worldview, and intellectual influences. Not about activism or partisan politics/electioneering (though important) or discussing organizational et ceteras. The name comes from the post-WWII conservative effort of "fusion" which sought to bring together the burgeoning strands of traditionalism, libertarianism, and anti-Communism. Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley, Jr. are perhaps the best-known personifications of this ideal. (Visit us on Facebook.)

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Irving Kristol's The Neoconservative Persuasion topic of Conservative Fusion

It is tonight. Join us.

From Gene Wisdom:

Neo-cons.  Those nasty neo-conservatives.  Suspect to many conservatives of other stripes, whether traditionalist, libertarian, paleo, or crunchy con, neo-conservatives have been described as liberals who were mugged by reality.  They are often, however, both misunderstood and misrepresented.  Many are labeled by another bugaboo--"Straussians"--by people who haven't read the first word of either neo-conservatives or Leo Strauss.  While their premises are often quite different they share many policy views of other conservatives and have learned lessons, from liberal policy failures, that many conservatives know implicitly.  Irving Kristol is perhaps the original neo-conservative.  This month's focus for Conservative Fusion Book Study is The Neoconservative Persuasion, a collection of Kristol's essays.  The study is an excellent opportunity to better understand neo-conservatism.  

 

Conservative Fusion was originally a group started through Meetup.com.  We have now moved to the next step, dropping the Meetup association and re-forming as a Facebook Group.  Join us for this study and future meetings!

This meeting will be at the home of Rod and Louella Williams on June 26th at 7PM. A Meetup automatic posting stated it would be June 19th. the correct date is June 26th.  Please RSVP to Gene Wisdom, hvillenavy@yahoo.com .

Comment from Rod: If you order the book for overnight delivery, you can still get it in time. I ordered mine on amazon and paid one penny, plus shipping! I don't know if the library has a copy or not. This is an important work and enjoyable reading. If you can get the book and can't read it all then start with the essay, "What is neoconservatism" and the essay "The neoconservative persuasion." If you can't read the book, but would like to come listen to the conversation, you can come on. I would be glad to have you. My home is conveniently located off 8th Ave South near Wedgewood. Reply to Gene at the above email for the address.

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Changed date for The Quest for Community, by Robert Nisbet.

Gene Wisdom changed the date for The Quest for Community, by Robert Nisbet. New date and time: Wednesday, May 22, 2013 7:00 PM.

Click here to see the latest changes: http://www.meetup.com/ConservativeFusion/events/110153732/

I love this book!  It is one of the most thought provoking books I have read in a very long time.  At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference in DC, this was the only book made the subject of a panel discussion in the Intercollegiate Studies Institute series of meetings there. A conservative classic, it will be thought provoking to both the libertarian and the traditionalist.

With the changed date there is time to order and read the book. Here is an Amazon link for ordering and a review of the book. 

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The Quest for Community, by Robert Nisbet

The Quest for Community, by Robert Nisbet will be the next selection of the Conservative Fusion book club. At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference in DC, this was the only book made the subject of a panel discussion in the Intercollegiate Studies Institute series of meetings there. A conservative classic, it will be thought provoking to both the libertarian and the traditionalist.

The Quest for Community: A Study in the Ethics of Order and ...

www.amazon.com  - One of the leading thinkers to emerge in the postwar conservative intellectual revival was the sociologist Robert Nisbet. His book The Quest for Community, published in 1953, stands as one of the most persuasive accounts of the dilemmas confronting modern society. 

 

Nearly a half century before Robert Putnam documented the atomization of society in Bowling Alone, Nisbet argued that the rise of the powerful modern state had eroded the sources of community—the family, the neighborhood, the church, the guild. Alienation and loneliness inevitably resulted. But as the traditional ties that bind fell away, the human impulse toward community led people to turn even more to the government itself, allowing statism—even totalitarianism—to flourish. 

 

ISI Books is proud to present this new edition of Nisbet’s magnum opus, featuring a brilliant introduction by New York Times columnist Ross Douthat and three critical essays. Published at a time when our communal life has only grown weaker and when many Americans display cultish enthusiasm for a charismatic president, this new edition of The Quest for Community shows that Nisbet’s insights are as relevant today as ever.

I look forward to reading and discussing this book. Please order the book, read it and join the discussion. The next meeting of Conservative Fusion will be Wednesday, April 24, 2013. Meetings are from 7PM-9PM. Sign up at this link: Conservative Fusion.

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Theodore and Woodrow: How Two American Presidents Destroyed Constitutional Freedom.

Theodore and Woodrow: How Two American Presidents Destroyed Constitutional Freedom.  America’s founding fathers saw freedom as a part of our nature to be protected—not to be usurped by the federal government—and so enshrined separation of powers and guarantees of freedom in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But a little over a hundred years after America’s founding, those God-given rights were laid siege by two presidents caring more about the advancement of progressive, redistributionist ideology than the principles on which America was founded.

The next meeting of Conservative Fusion book club will be  Wednesday, March 20, 2013, at 7:30PM. Please plan to attend now. There is time to order the book, read it and attend.

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Men and Marriage, by George Gilder

Wednesday, February 27, 2013 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Gene & Vicki Wisdom's home

From Amazon: Men and Marriage is a critical commentary that asks the burning question, How can society survive the pervasive disintegration of the family? A profound crisis faces modern social order as traditional family relationships become almost unrecognizable. George Gilder's Men and Marriage is a revised and expanded edition of his 1973 landmark work, Sexual Suicide . He examines the deterioration of the family, the well-defined sex roles it offered, and how this change has shifted the focus of our society. Poverty, for instance, stems from the destruction of the family when unmarried parents are abandoned by their lovers or older women are divorced because society approves of their husbands' younger girlfriends. Gilder claims that men will only fulfill their paternal obligations when women lead them to do so, and that this civilizing influence, balanced with proper economic support, is the most important part of maintaining a productive, healthy, loving society. He offers a concrete plan for rebuilding the family in America. His solutions challenge readers to return to these roles and reestablish the family values that were once so crucial in staving off the ills that plague our country. Gilder insists that it is time to reexamine what "liberation" has wrought and at what cost. Only a return to traditional family values, he contends, can stem the tide of disaster. George Gilder is the author of Wealth and Poverty , the best-selling critique of Reaganomics.

Join the discussion. Please RSVP at this link. 

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The roles of men and women

From Gene wisdom:

I'm very much looking forward to the discussion on this book, which is easily in my top five favorites in over 35 years of reading politics.  I know we're coming up on the meeting date but I know that even if you don't get it all read you'll find his arguments, based solidly in the nature and roles of men and women, intriguing.  From his solidly rooted premises he then goes on to discuss the impact of that nature on society and the consequences when government intrudes.  I believe that both libertarians and social conservatives will find much to agree on here.  Even if you don't get all the way through the book I think you'll be quite ready to get into the discussion.  EVEN IF YOU CAN'T MAKE IT TO THE MEETING I'm pretty confident in saying that you'll enjoy and appreciate Gilder's insights here.  Again, the link to the book on Amazon.  Hard to beat the price there too.

http://www.amazon.com/Men-Marriage-George-Gilder/dp/0882899465/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1360196026&sr=1-1&keywords=men+and+marriage+george+gilder

This is one of those books that I should have read a long time ago and just never got around to it. It is great! So much of what makes our society function and stable is beyond fidelity to the constitution or wise economic policy; it is cultural. A stable, strong, free society is also a function of the character of the people and morality. It has to do with the social norms and values. We often say that family is the basic building block of society. This book explains why that is so and explains the roll that sex, marriage, and socialization play in building a stable society. Why does marriage matter? Is it true that nature determines the roll of women in society but that the roll of men is a social construct? 

Conservative Fusion will meet Wednesday, Feb. 20th at Gene's home. Follow this link for more information. Rod

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Join the discussion at Conservative Fusion: Is America's founding secure?

This meeting was scheduled for last week, but due to a travel advisory it was rescheduled to this week.  We will be meeting Wednesday, January 23rd, 7PM to 9PM at my home. Please go to this link to register so I will know how many people to prepare for and you will be given the address at that link. I will provide wine, beer, soft drinks and snack food.

If you have thought about attending a meeting of this group but never have because you failed to read the book, well this time there is no book. We have had a few of these meetings where we discuss a question or have a debate instead of a book to read. These generate some interesting exploration of ideas. Just think about the question and come on. Here are my suggestion for thoughts to ponder as you contemplate the topic question:

• What do we mean by "the founding?" 
• Is the founding secure? Why or why not?
• How "perfect" was the union originally?
• Were there tensions present at the founding that are still with us today?
• If our founding is not secure, where did we go wrong?
• Are the principles present at the founding still guiding principles today?
• Is our founding endangered by changing values and the changing character of the American people?
• If our founding is not secure, what steps must we take to secure it. 

February Meeting to discuss Men and Marriage. 
Following the meeting this Wednesday, the next meeting of Conservative Fusion will be February 20th and we will be discussing  Men and Marriage by George Guilder. This is one of those important books that I know about but have never read. I am looking forward to reading it. Get your copy now, so you can read it and be prepared for the discussion in February. Here is a link to Amazon were you can order the book.

From the Back Cover

"Men and Marriage . . . is an outstandingly important and well-argued book." National Review. 

 

Drug Addiction, lack of education, welfare, children in poverty, violence, unemployment, single-parent homes-these critical problems facing our country today. Many ideas have been presented regarding the cause of these problems, but only George Gilder speaks directly and with authority about their one undeniable source: the disintegration of the American family. Men and Marriage examines the loss of the family and the well-defined sex roles it used to offer and how this loss has changed the focus of our society. Poverty, for instance, comes from the destruction of the family when single parents are abandoned by their lovers or older women are suddenly divorced because society approves of the husband's new, younger girlfriend. Gilder claims that men will only own up to their paternal obligations when the women lead them to do so and that this civilizing influence, balanced with, proper economic support, is the most important part of maintaining a productive, healthy, loving society. He offers a concrete plan of action for rebuilding the family in America. His solutions challenge readers to return to these roles and reestablish those family values which were once so crucial in staving off the ills that plague our country. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

About the Author

George Gilder is author of several books on social and economic issues. He was a speech writer for President Reagan and now writes regularly for the Wall Street Journal and Harpers.

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Conservative Fusion this Tuesday: Is America's Founding secure?

If you have thought about getting involved in the Conservative Fusion group but have not done so because when it rolled around you had not yet read the book, well this time you don't have an excuse. There is no book to read this month.

We will be discussing ,"Is America's Founding Secure?"  Bring you ideas on the topic and join the conversation. I will be hosting the event at my house offering soft drinks, wine, beer, and snacks. The event starts at 7PM. Please RSVP at this link or just email me at Rodwilliams47@yahoo.com.

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This Wednesday: The Electoral College: Time to Scrap It? A Debate

Conservative Fusion is a book club that reads important books of interest to conservatives and libertarians. For this meeting however, there is no book to read; instead, there will be a debate on whether or not it is time to abolish the electoral college and have direct popular election of the president.

 Meeting: Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM

To RSVP and get location, follow this link. Conservative Fusion Meetup.

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The Electoral College: Time to Scrap It?

A Debate sponsored by Conservative Fusion.

Gene Wisdom changed the date and time for The Electoral College: Time to Scrap It? 
New date and time: Wednesday, December 19, 2012 7:00 PM

Click here to see the latest changes: http://www.meetup.com/ConservativeFusion/events/91884112/

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Conservative Fusion to read The The Tyranny of Cliches, by Jonah Goldberg

Tuesday, November 27, 2012, 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM

To join the discussion to the meetup site: Conservative Fusion.

Needs a location  (I will host unless we get a better offer. Rod)
 
From Gene Wisdom, event organizer:

We earlier discussed his bestseller Liberal Fascism, which exposed liberalism's intellectual ties to fascism, a doctrine of the Left, not the Right. Goldberg has an excellent way in his books and other writings of being able to look deeply into a subject with both great wit and keen insight. It is my belief that part of making oneself a better conservative is developing a clear understanding of liberalism. Goldberg does that by showing us the liberal emperor has no clothes, and that there is very little intellectual substance to it.

Book Description from Amazon.com

Release Date: May 1, 2012

The bestselling author of Liberal Fascism dismantles the progressive myths that are passed-off as wisdom in our schools, media and politics.

According to Jonah Goldberg, if the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist, the greatest trick liberals ever pulled was convincing themselves that they’re not ideological.

Today, “objective” journalists, academics and “moderate” politicians peddle some of the most radical arguments by hiding them in homespun aphorisms.  Barack Obama casts himself as a disciple of reason and sticks to one refrain above all others: he’s a pragmatist, opposed to the ideology and dogma of the right, solely concerned with “what works.” And today’s liberals follow his lead, spouting countless clichés such as:

• One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter: Sure, if the other man is an idiot. Was Martin Luther King Jr. a terrorist? Was Bin Laden a freedom fighter?
• Violence never solves anything: Really? It solved our problems with the British empire and ended slavery.
• Better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man suffer: So you won’t mind if those ten guilty men move next door to you?
• Diversity is strength: Cool.The NBA should have a quota for midgets and one-legged point guards!
• We need complete separation of church and state: In other words all expressions of faith should be barred from politics …except when they support liberal programs.
  

With humor and passion, Goldberg dismantles these and many other Trojan Horses that liberals use to cheat in the war of ideas. He shows that the grand Progressive tradition of denying an ideological agenda while pursuing it vigorously under the false-flag of reasonableness is alive and well.  And he reveals how this dangerous game may lead us further down the path of self-destruction.

There is time to order the book and join us. Please do. We chat and socialize for about thirty minutes and then get down to some serious discussion. Rod

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Our Enemy the State, by Albert Jay Nock, Tuesday, Oct. 30

Conservative Fusion Book Club meeting
 7:00 PM 
Location is shown only to members 
5 days left! 
Will you attend? Join Us.

Book Description from Amazon
Publication Date: January 1, 1935

What does one need to know about politics? In some ways, Nock has summed it all up in this astonishing book, the influence of which has grown every year since its publication. Nock was a prominent essayist at the height of the New Deal. In 1935, hardly any public intellectuals were making much sense at all. They pushed socialism. They pushed fascism. Everyone had a plan. Hardly anyone considered the possibility that the state was not fixing society but destroying it bit by bit. And so Albert Jay Nock came forward to write what needed to be written. And he ended up penning a classic of American political commentary, one that absolutely must be read by every student of economics and government.

One realizes many important points about Nock when reading this. First, he was brilliant, original, and courageous. Second, he hated politics -- indeed he hated politics so much that he wanted a society that was completely free of it. This is why he is often described as anarchist. Third, he surely was one of the great stylists of the English language in the history of 20th century writing. Those who have read Nock know that there is something about his writing that tugs very deeply on one's conscience and soul. This book will linger in your mind as you read the daily headlines. He makes his points so well that they become unforgettable.

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What would the founding fathers tell Barack Obama

What would the founding fathers tell Barack Obama if they could come back from the beyond to talk to him? Would they think he is leading the Country in the right direction or the wrong direction? What advice would they have for him? Would President Obama be willing to take their advice? Ross Edward Puskar in Founding Fathers Know Best gives his answers to these intriguing questions.

George Washington, President of the "President Club", sends his top team of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison back to the White House to talk to President Obama and offer him advice on everything from gas prices, our rising debt, class warfare, immigration policy, healthcare and more.

In this satire, the author combines teaching history lessons, philosophical concepts, and an explanation of the uniqueness and wisdom of the Constitution into an easy to read entertaining tale. Complicated concepts are easily explained without those explanations becoming simplistic and wisdom is presented as the common sense of great men. The personalities of the various spirits shine through as for seven evenings they meet with President Obama, analyze the issue facing our country and give advice informed by experience and over two hundred years of observing the successes and failures of their successors.

This is Ross Puskar’s first book and well worth reading. Anyone who loves history or is concerned about the state of our nation should read this book. I hope to read more from this talented author.

For more on this book follow this link.

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"Our Enemy the State" by Albert Jay Nock is the next selection of Conservative Fusion

Conservative Fusion is a gathering of fellow conservatives of various stripes who enjoy discussing and debating political ideas, philosophy, worldview, intellectual influences, and exploring and discovering the philosophical foundations of conservatism and a free and well-ordered society. In the past I have participated in Libertarian Party supper clubs in Huntsville, Montgomery, and Birmingham, Alabama and I am hopeful of finding other conservatives, libertarians, and Constitutionalists in the Nashville area who are ready for something similar, an opportunity to gather and discuss varying conservative perspectives and principles and not partisan political electioneering or organizational minutiae. Not looking for a gathering of conspiracy theorists, "Truth-ers", or "Birth-ers", but rather reasonable-minded conservatives from a variety of strands--traditionalists, libertarians, social conservatives, fiscal/economic conservatives, religious/Christian conservatives, neo-conservatives, New Right conservatives, Old Right conservatives, etc. Come join us!

Gene Wisdom

Our Enemy the State, by Albert Jay Nock
Book Description Publication
Date: 2009

What does one need to know about politics? In some ways, Nock has summed it all up in this astonishing book. Here was a prominent essayist at the height of the New Deal. In 1935, hardly any public intellectuals were making much sense at all. They pushed socialism. They pushed fascism. Everyone had a plan. Hardly anyone considered the possibility that the state was not fixing society but destroying it bit by bit. And so Albert Jay Nock came forward to write what need to be written. And he ended up penning a classic of American political commentary, one that absolutely must be read by every student of economics and government.

Consider his opening two paragraphs:

If we look beneath the surface of our public affairs, we can discern one fundamental fact, namely: a great redistribution of power between society and the State. This is the fact that interests the student of civilization. He has only a secondary or derived interest in matters like price-fixing, wage-fixing, inflation, political banking, "agricultural adjustment," and similar items of State policy that fill the pages of newspapers and the mouths of publicists and politicians.

All these can be run up under one head. They have an immediate and temporary importance, and for this reason they monopolize public attention, but they all come to the same thing; which is, an increase of State power and a corresponding decrease of social power. 

229 pages, paperback

Location and date to be announced. There is time to order and read the book.
To join Conservative Fusion book club, follow this link.

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