That seems to have been the main message in remarks delivered by
Stephen Moore , at a Bradley Center Symposium in February.
Though "the ideological and public policy shift to the right in the United States over the past 30 years has been both stunning and uplifting" there's much left to do.
The successes Moore claims are as follows:
First, tax rates have fallen dramatically in the U.S. and around the world. When Reagan entered office the highest tax rate was 70%. Today the highest tax rate is 36%. A Heritage foundation study recently discovered that across the globe, tax rates have fallen by an average of almost 20 percentage points. Russia and other Eastern European nations are adopting flat taxes.
Second, inflation has been tamed with the intellectual routing of the illogical Keynsian notion of the Phillips Curve and the idea tha inflation and unemployment are a tradeoff. Inflation rates, which hit a high tof 13% in 1980, have been replaced with stable prices.
Third, free trade is on the march, though this movement goes through political peaks and valleys. NAFTA and other trade agreements have led to lower tariffs globally.
Fourth, socialism has been routed and as Reagan put it, has been relegated to the "dustbin of history."
Fifth, welfare reform was enacted in the United States in 1996 and has been one of the great policy triumphs of the last 50 years.
And sixth, the policy debate in Washington as I write these remarks is dominated by talk of litigation reform, Social Security private accounts, a flat tax and death tax repeal--to name a few.
So what's left to do?
But now we are starting to see the Left's counterassault against conservative victories in the policy wars and in the elections. George Soros and other billionaire liberals recently vowed to raise $100 million over the next two years to sponsor new thought and build new think tanks, new political machines, new grassroots operations.
Hence, we as conservatives cannot sit on our past policy victories or our recent electoral successes. This is a chess match against the Left and the tactics that won twenty years ago may not be victorious over the next quarter century.
I would argue that going forward, there are four central challenges ahead for the conservative movement.
First, we must win the wars that are not complete. Social Security reform, legal reform, and tax reform are all at the top of the Bush agenda and it is clear that these corrupt and decaying institutions--the legal system, the tax code, and the Social Security program--are in dire need of modernization.
Second, the education system is getting worse, not better. Market-based education reforms are the next big clash between Left and Right in this country, and it's a fight we can't lose or our capitalist system will be in real jeopardy. We need to topple the educational blob--which is depriving at least half of American children from obtaining a successful financial future.
Now comes a puzzlement. I haven't a clue what this is about.
Third, we must seize control of the next generation of wealth. In the next 10-20 years, trillions of dollars of wealth will be passed on through trusts, foundations, and inheritances. The Left is looking to create the next generation of Ford and Rockefeller Foundations with these massive wealth holdings. We must protect against this and insure that money that is meant to build-up free market institutions isn't intercepted and used to tear them down.
Nor does this make a whole lot of sense.
Finally, we need to continue to build out a conservative alternative media and work to penetrate Hollywood. We are in much better shape today in having a voice for conservatives, thanks to the internet, talk radio, and FOXNews, but the mainstream media is as hostile as ever to free markets. We are nowhere near parity when it comes to media coverage of politics. Hollywood hates conservatives, though we are gaining footholds in the entertainment industry and we need to nurture, protect and multiply the conservative presence in Hollywood.
And he closes what seems to be the point.
So we need the conservative foundations to help fund these new strategies for winning the war of ideas and we need MORE conservative foundations whose missions are never intercepted by the Left. Since most foundations begin with a conservative mandate from the original donors, but are soon captured by the Left, a program to safeguard the sanctity of donor intent would be a huge leap forward for the conservative movement and would have the double blessing of defunding the Left.