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Sean Hannity speaks at The Heritage Foundation’s President’s Club Meeting.

Hannity: Conservatives need ‘bold colors’

Talk radio host Sean Hannity speaks to President’s Club members on Monday.

» Watch excerpts of Hannity’s keynote address

Conservatives must once again take up “bold colors” and eschew “pale pastels” if they are to be successful in restoring principled government, talk radio host Sean Hannity said Monday at The Heritage Foundation’s spring President’s Club Meeting in Washington.

» Watch excerpts of Hannity’s keynote address

This rededication to timeless principles is especially true as conservatives and their allies have seen recent political defeat, he told hundreds of President’s Club members gathered at the Ronald Reagan Center in downtown Washington. Only by standing up for these core ideals can conservatives distinguish their ideas from the discredited premises of the Left.

Hannity drew inspiration from Ronald Reagan’s 1975 address to the Conservative Political Action Conference in which he urged conservatives not to “moderate” their positions and adopt the ideas of the Left but instead to “rais[e] a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people.”

One of Heritage’s partners in the year-long What Would Reagan Do? campaign broadcast on radio stations nationwide, Hannity broadcast his radio program on Monday from Heritage’s state-of-the-art Robert H. Bruce Radio Studio.

Past speakers at President’s Club meetings have included President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Lady Margaret Thatcher, Rush Limbaugh, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani and more. Join the President’s Club today for your invitation to the next meeting, on Nov. 10 and 11 in Washington, D.C.

How will conservatives fare?

Michael Barone and Fred Barnes discuss conseratives’ prospects in 2008.

“It’s been a great political year for conservatives,” political analyst Michael Barone told President’s Club members on Monday. “In Britain,” he added after a pause.

But in this country, he and Weekly Standard executive editor Fred Barnes said, the prospects aren’t so bright for conservatives in the November elections. Scandals, outside events and misguided policies have conspired to darken conservatives’ electoral outlook.

In many ways, the political landscape is broadly changed from that of the elections in 2000 and 2004. Barone said that we should toss out the map of closely divided “red” and “blue” states. Instead, we face what he called an “open field” in which moderate voters are to be wooed and turnout of conservative and liberal activists matters less.

Hearing from the experts

President’s Club members also heard updates on today’s most important issues from Heritage Foundation experts.

In a small session on Monday morning, Heritage economists David John and J.D. Foster addressed members’ questions on the economy and the proper government response to the mortgage crisis. Health care expert Bob Moffit, speaking at another small session, explained how to leverage free enterprise to strengthen the nation’s health care system and improve consumer choice.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) speaks to members of Heritage’s Executive Committee during the President’s Club Meeting.

During the afternoon session on Monday, Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner outlined Heritage’s latest work on the ten-year Leadership for America campaign. Alison Fraser and Stuart Butler outlined Heritage’s research on the consequences of runaway government spending on entitlements and our work to build awareness on the Fiscal Wakeup Tour. Finally, Vice President of Foreign and Defense Policy Studies Kim Holmes discussed his new book, Liberty’s Best Hope, and explained the need for America to once again lead in the world.

On Tuesday morning, national security James Carafano explained the importance of Heritage’s work on national security and took questions on illegal immigration. Director of Domestic Policy Studies Jennifer Marshall explained the importance of traditional values and how The Heritage Foundation provides answers to many of today’s most important questions on family, personal responsibility and the welfare state. Matthew Spalding, director of Heritage’s B. Kenneth Simon Center for American Studies, addressed the need to restore our nation’s first principles to their proper role at the heart of every public policy debate. And Director of Strategic Operations Genevieve Wood wrapped up the panel discussion with an explanation of how Heritage plans to execute its ten-year Leadership for America campaign and ensure its success.

Other Heritage work of note

Entrepreneurship. This month, the government started mailing “rebate” checks to millions of Americans in a misguided effort to “stimulate” the economy at taxpayer expense. Heritage economists worked hard to explain to lawmakers that this is the wrong approach to an economic downturn and that mailing out checks will have little effect. Unfortunately, Congress and the President succumbed to political pressure to “do something” and passed the legislation regardless of its ineffectiveness.

American Leadership and First Principles. The Conservative Party’s victories in Britain’s local elections last week increase the likelihood that David Cameron will succeed Labour’s Gordon Brown on Downing Street, Heritage’s Nile Gardiner writes in the Weekly Standard Tuesday. Such a victory would give Conservatives “an opportunity to restore British sovereignty in Europe, rebuild the UK’s military power, and re-energize the Anglo-American alliance.”

But we should be wary of reading right-of-center victories overseas as triumphs for sound conservative principles. Writing on National Review Online, Gardiner points out that French President Nicolas Sarkozy has largely failed to live up to his billing as a free-market reformer.

Entrepreneurship. In response to widespread reports of unsafe consumer products, Congress is looking hard at a plan to create a government database of consumer product safety complaints and comments. Such a scheme, Heritage legal expert Andrew Grossman reports, would increase the burden on government regulators, potentially reducing their ability to detect real safety problems, and drive effective and innovative private consumer safety groups out of business.

Family and Religion. This month, Heritage’s FamilyFacts.org is featuring a study noting the relationship between family stability and scholastic achievement, specifically in math. “Adolescents who experienced fewer family structure changes growing up (e.g., changes in their parents’ marital status) were more likely to graduate from high school having completed Algebra II than without having completed it compared to peers who experienced less family stability,” the compendium of data supporting traditional values reports.

In other news

Even as liberals insist that free enterprise cannot address the rising costs of health care, Wal-Mart has expanded its low-price prescription drug program to include more types of medication and larger supplies of medication. Furthermore, free-market competition is bearing fruit as Target stores are following Wal-Mart’s lead and offering reduced-price drugs.

Israel celebrates 60 years of independence this week.

Unless Congress passes emergency war-funding legislation promptly, the military will be unable to pay troops starting in June, the Pentagon warns.

In the interest of maintaining the support of the local population, American troops in Afghanistan are no longer destroying the poppy crops upon which much of the local economy depends.

British police report that the vastly expanded use of video surveillance has failed to curb crime. Heritage experts have pointed out the failure of video surveillance before before and demonstrated that other methods, like use of the death penalty, can be effective deterrents.

Coming up at Heritage

To attend these or any other events at Heritage please RSVP at Heritage’s website. Or you can view these events live online. All times are Eastern.

On Thursday, May 8 at 10:30 a.m., a panel of legal experts joins former Attorney General Ed Meese for a discussion of the proper federal role in hate crimes.

On Thursday, May 8 at 11:00 a.m., the commander of American forces in Europe, Gen. Bantz Craddock, delivers a special address at The Heritage Foundation.

On Tuesday, May 13 at 9:30 a.m., Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) joins a panel of experts including five British members of the European Parliament to discuss American policy towards Europe and the European Union.

Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation. Chris Albright contributed to this report.