What is There to the American Dream Other Than Toasters, Cars, and Houses?

Mandeville, LA – Exclusive Transcript – Government is just a tool.  People say, “I want to reduce the size and the scope.”  If you’re going to reduce the size and the scope, then you’re going to have to enlarge the sphere of virtue.  You’re going to have to enlarge the sphere of — I’m sorry, I have to say this — chivalry and manliness.  Men, you’re actually going to have to be men for once in our lives again.  You’re going to have to start putting your foot down and you’re going to have to start running your family as a family.  Things will descend from that, from a natural hierarchical order of things.  We’re going to have to be the leaders. Check out today’s transcript for more…

 

Begin Mike Church Show Transcript

Mike:  Just remember the early GOP debates we covered where there were seven and eight candidates, how disjointed that seemed because ultimately, what happened?

AG:  Johnson got two minutes.

Mike:  It was Rick Perry versus Mitt Romney.

AG:  Is there an answer in terms of, do you ultimately get to have x-amount of candidates on there?

Mike:  I can answer your question.  There is no answer.  Contained in the speech that Russell Kirk wrote for Barry Goldwater is at least part of the answer, and in what Winston Elliott wrote that I read on the air earlier today.  Government is just a tool.  People say, [mocking] “I want to reduce the size and the scope.”  If you’re going to reduce the size and the scope, then you’re going to have to enlarge the sphere of virtue.  You’re going to have to enlarge the sphere of — I’m sorry, I have to say this — chivalry and manliness.  Men, you’re actually going to have to be men for once in our lives again.  You’re going to have to start putting your foot down and you’re going to have to start running your family as a family.  Things will descend from that, from a natural hierarchical order of things.  We’re going to have to be the leaders.  When I read that little piece of the Kirk speech earlier, I was reading about how:

[reading]

Our conservative task of saving mankind from collective degradation will not make you rich; [Mike: Well, how many people want to engage in something that’s not going to make them wealthy?] probably it will not make you powerful; [Mike: How many people want to get involved in a power struggle that’s not going to accrue any power to you?] possibly it may mean that you will live harder and less long than if you were content to be a slave or a coward.  [Mike: How many people want to live less long?]  This task has one high reward: the consciousness of being fully human, in the cause of truth and Justice and of man as God meant him to be.  You have the talent and the training for the duty that is yours.  I am confident that you will not fail to stand up for the things which make life worth living.

[end reading]

To put a coda on the end of that with what Winston had written at The American Conservative magazine:

[reading]

I desire to restore a republic rooted in faith, family, and local community.  I respect the dignity of the human person and oppose political ideologies that promote an abstract liberty.  I do not believe our primary enemy is government.  Man’s primary enemy is found in original sin and its effects.  Contrary to the argument that government is evil, I recognize that government is a tool.  It is the persons wielding the tool who may do evil.  In my view, the vote for president is a choice between the two major party candidates.  [Mike: Then he goes into why he thinks one is preferable over the other.]  We don’t have to like either candidate.  We aren’t picking a roommate.  As in much of life, we are not presented with an ideal choice but choose we must or others will do it for us.  The sad truth is that many Americans believe that we should have a nanny state that will take care of us.  Is this the fault of the politicians?  No, it is the failure of the citizens of the Republic.  The fault is not in our stars but in ourselves.

[end reading]

Mike:  Kirk had written about material prosperity and how material prosperity back in the 1960’s was what Americans were wielding against communism.  Russell Kirk had a slight problem with that.  He wondered isn’t there something else we’re better at than the communists, than making better toasters and lawnmowers?  Is there something we do better than the Commies other than manufacture automobiles?

[reading]

Fascinated by stories of the gold rush, land hunger, and buffalo hunting, they ignore the real story – the story of pioneers with the spiritual fibre to overcome impossible material obstacles to carve a civilization out of the wilderness.  The same sort of materialist vision which distorts the true meaning of the opening of the West, is presenting a picture of America to the world which interprets the ideals of America in purely economic terms.  [Mike: I think he’s onto something, or he was onto something, way back in 1962, Barry Goldwater was.]  We have seen a world-wide publicity campaign which offers a mail-order catalogue as the quintessence of the American Dream – a sort of materialist substitute for the Bible.  Somehow the idea has gotten abroad that the way to share the American ideal is to become bigger, fatter and more luxurious.  People are beginning to believe that to be American is simply to have more food and more complicated gadgets.

[end reading]

Mike:  That whole thing about the American Dream doesn’t have anything to do with securing your freedoms and liberties and then passing them onto your posterity.  It has to do with making sure your kid can live in a suburb with a brand-new BMW in the driveway and a 3500-square-foot house.

End Mike Church Show Transcript