cText One Year Anniversary

Well folks, it’s finally here. I am quite excited to announce that I have passed a milestone in one of the most interesting endeavors in my life. Of course, that endeavor has been blogging. Yes, that’s right, this is my one-year blogging anniversary.

It’s been quite the experience. I have learned much, matured a great deal, and I have met a tremendous number of amazing people from blogging.

Since you’re reading this particular post, I know you’re interested in this momentous day of mine. I’ll start out with giving you a history about why I started blogging and where I am today. I’ll end with giving credit where credit is due and leaving you with a brief return to the past. As well, I didn’t forget my weekly political post. It’s the article below this article.



In the early summer of 2003, I was a 15-year-old brat who was openly pro-abortion, pro-UN, anti-War on Terror, and on the verge of hating President Bush (yes, me, Caleb, your favorite far-right wing, conservative, fundamentalist religious extremist). That all changed, however, when I started to meet some really cool dudes (and dudets) at my job I had that summer. They began to talk about these issues and began to show me that the liberal point of view was rather, shall we say, obtuse.

During the fall of 2004, I began to volunteer on the Colorado Bush/Cheney 2004 Presidential Campaign. Being a huge fan of Rush Limbaugh, I began to hear about these odd little websites called blogs. Blogs were becoming a great asset to the Bush Campaign, and I (being part of that campaign) wanted to start learning about these blogs. November 2, 2004 (election day), was a date that cemented in my mind that blogs were here to stay. On November 3, 2004, while I was taking a tour of the rocket construction facilities for Lockheed Martin (yes, for real), I decided it was time to become part of something that was larger than my stock market trades.

November 11, 2004, a small, insignificant blog appeared on AOL Journals. Basically no one knew about it (I only emailed 12 people about it, of which only 5 or 6 of them started reading). This blog was The Dude Page. The Dude Page, a political blog, began to grow as I started writing more and linking to other people. The Dude Page grew from a webpage operated by a novice 16 year old teenager to a political website that received significant recognition from AOL itself (I was #5 on the Top 5 AOL Political Blogs with The Dude Page).

My blogging had grown so much a part of me, in fact, that I wanted to delve deeper into the blogosphere and become a much more respected blogger. AOL Journals, however, had many significant restrictions. The top two were long URL addresses and non-AOL folks couldn’t comment. A blogging friend had just switched over to an unfamiliar blog-hosting site, Blogger.com. After much intense deliberation with myself, family, and a few selected friends, I decided to end The Dude Page (sentimentally a very hard thing to do, believe me) and begin a new Blogger blog called Conservative Textbook.

Since Conservative Textbook is my current blog, I won’t go into details about it because that would be boring. Some time ago I joined a second blog, The Red Voice, and became a weekly contributor to that blog. That has been very influential on me because it has opened my eyes to many different, conservative perspectives.

And that, my friends, is a brief history on my blogging career. I would now like to take a few lines to thank several people that have helped me out with my blogging. First and foremost, thanks to my family for all your support with this “crazy” idea. I would like to thank Ian for helping me with choosing the name Conservative Textbook (I originally was going to call the blog Caleb Land). Anna, thanks for proofreading my work at 11:30pm over e-mail. Jess, thanks for your down-to-earth thinking with topics (you’ve actually been a source of a lot of topics, believe it or not).

To my blogging buddies – thanks Pat for your suggestions on writing over the Internet. Armand, thanks for being my boss at TRV. Thanks to Jen (of Republican Jen) for being the FIRST blog I ever linked to and in return was linked on. Thanks Mr. Jeremy C. for being the standard I measure my blog against (maybe one day I’ll be as large a blog site as you are). Finally, thank you Blake for being a very realistic person who always reminds me of how to be real on my blog.

To some new blogging friends – thanks Kristin (Spunky Jr.) for your advice on growing a blog. Gracias Alex (SmartHomeschool) for your advice as well. Also, some thanks go to Tim (Agent Tim). My goal is to one day get my blog as physically impressive as your blog is right now. Finally, thanks Matt for being the Colorado blog I wish I could have been.

Finally, to all you liberals out there – thanks a ton. To tell you the truth, if you guys didn’t come around and aggravate me on my blog, things just wouldn’t be fun at all. So thanks Dave (honestly), Chris (keep it up, surfah dude) and all you others.

To close, I would like to leave you with a bit of nostalgia – the very first post I ever wrote for a blog (the first post of my first blog, The Dude Page). It’s untouched and unedited; it’s the very article that appeared on 11/11/2004 (to tell you the truth, I have every single post I ever did on The Dude Page stored on my Macintosh laptop). It’s a bit embarrassing how poor the writing style is on this ancient post, but that’s the price I have to pay to show you guys this old post.

I look forward to another fun, exciting, annoying, tiresome and memorable year of blogging with you guys.

Let's Start

Yo,

Hey, for those of you who just started coming here, go to the bottom of this page to see my welcome. You do wanna see it because it explains alot about what goes on here.

Well, let's begin this blog with something easy. How about the election. Yes, I know that it's sort of old news now, but it'll get this blog going because it will bring up numerous topics. In fact, I'll start us out on a topic even (I'm so nice. LOL).

As you can probably guess, I'm very happy with the election. Bush held on to the White House, a good thing. Congress has even more Republicans now, and the GOP has a firm majority in the Senate now. Also a good thing. It's still hard to say what will happen with the Supreme Court at this point because of Senator Specter, but the Supreme Court should be much more conservative by the time this is all over.

Well, that's my view on it. It was a major victory for the GOP because we now have a good majority in Washington. This of course, is good for several reasons. Let's address one of them.

Abortion:

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm very pro-life. I mean, why should a baby have to be murdered because of the actions the mother took? What about rape you say? Well, rape is a terrible terrible thing, and I can't imagine how bad it must be for the mother to have to carry around a baby because of what happened to her. But, the point still stands, is it right for a mother to do violence to a baby because violence was done to her? I don't think so. In any case, the mother does not have to keep the baby once it has been born. She can give it to an adoption center if she doesn't want it. But don't kill the baby. Anyways, people say that abortion is good for the mother in the long run. No, it's not, because nearly all women who had an abortion feel guilty for the rest of their lives because they killed an innocent life. They do, look it up.

So, do I think that abortion will be outlawed if Bush gets the right judges past the Senate? I can't say. If they could get into the Supreme Court, it could happen. But still, outlawing abortion would be a HUGE deal, and I don't know if we could do it realistically. Do I want it done, yes. Do I think it can happen? It's too early to tell.

So, that's where I stand. What about you?

Bush Fights Back

I am pumped folks. I haven’t been this happy since the snowboarding season started back in October. I could not have had a better subject for my one-year post than this – Bush fights back.

The War on Terrorism has received much abuse by those who wish our country ill, namely liberals. They have been undermining, distorting, and out-right lying about the war’s goals and reasons for existence. Liberals have been the greatest allies the terrorists could have ever prayed for.

President Bush, of course, has done a lousy job defending the War on Terrorism and its Afghanistan and Iraqi theaters. That, however, is going to change. President Bush has finally fought back and has attacked those who are attacking America, namely liberals.

In a powerful speech to veterans on a day that all Americans should take time to remember, Veterans Day, President Bush laid out his view of the past few years. He outlined the dangers terrorists present and how America has been fighting them with global support from everyone except countries who are in lockdown due to riots. I have highlighted in blue the key points in this excerpt (for those of you who don’t want to read the whole thing).

(Bush) While it's perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began. Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war. These critics are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community's judgments related to Iraq's weapons programs.

They also know that intelligence agencies from around the world agreed with our assessment of Saddam Hussein. They know the United Nations passed more than a dozen resolutions citing his development and possession of weapons of mass destruction. And many of these critics supported my opponent during the last election, who explained his position to support the resolution in the Congress this way: "When I vote to give the President of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein, it is because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a threat, and a grave threat, to our security." That's why more than a hundred Democrats in the House and the Senate -- who had access to the same intelligence -- voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power.

The stakes in the global war on terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges. These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America's will. As our troops fight a ruthless enemy determined to destroy our way of life, they deserve to know that their elected leaders who voted to send them to war continue to stand behind them. Our troops deserve to know that this support will remain firm when the going gets tough. And our troops deserve to know that whatever our differences in Washington, our will is strong, our nation is united, and we will settle for nothing less than victory.

That small excerpt is what Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingram, Hugh Hewitt, Matt Drudge, Michael Medved, Ann Coulter, etc. have been proclaiming for years, and finally Bush has come out to defend these decisions, provide reasons for safe-guarding America and for annihilating murdering butchers known as Islamic terrorists (to the Left in America they are known as Freedom Fighters of course).

There is no reason for me to say anymore. In fact, if President Bush keeps this up, there won’t be much need for the conservative media to keep saying these things. The Left won’t be able to lie to the American people much longer if Bush continues to defend his correct actions.

That is another important lesson from the Conservative Textbook curriculum.

Why A Conservative (Part 3)

Where is the future of the conservative movement? What can we expect from it in years to come? What positions will it hold, who will be its main base, and will it maintain majority status? These are questions that both conservatives and liberals ask themselves behind closed doors, with friends, and in the secret war rooms of politics.

I will not dare attempt to predict where the movement is headed for the long term. I will, however, take you on a tour of some philosophies that are shaping the conservative movement of tomorrow. I will also give you what I believe are the primary choices for the conservative movement in the next decades.

Perhaps the most important issue facing the next generation of the conservative movement (my generation to be exact) is whether or not fiscal conservatism will be followed. This issue has arisen because so many of the Republicans in the U.S. Congress have been spending money like it is going out of fashion. While Republicans are still very pro-tax relief, they are extremely spending hungry as well. This cannot and will not last forever though.

There are two possible outcomes for this situation. The first possible outcome is that conservatives will reassert themselves and attempt to bring spending back under control. There are signs that such a possibility might become a reality soon if things continue to go as they are.

The other possibility is that conservatives will cease to be fiscal conservatives. This would have extraordinary consequences, and would dramatically change the entire political landscape of the United States. As anyone can guess, this could be nothing but positive for the liberals. Liberals would see this as an opportunity to take back control of this country and would probably masquerade under the disguise of the fiscally responsible party. Of course, this would be only a trick to gain control again. The other outcome of this would be a split in the conservative movement, which would also allow liberals to gain the upper hand in the war of ideas.

As we all know (especially those who have been reading the “Why A Conservative Trilogy”), the other primary camp in the conservative movement are the social conservatives. This side of the conservative movement, the more loyal of the two, does not possess quite as much of an uncertain future as the fiscal conservative camp.

The reason I say this is because I believe the social conservative movement will not be much of a factor in years to come. As far as I can tell, I believe the social conservative movement will dwindle in power and influence due to key factors outside of its control – namely liberal control over education. Social conservatism is the harder to defend of the two branches of conservatism; therefore, for many students it is difficult to explain adequately to a hostile teacher/professor. If something cannot be defended well in the eyes of a student, many times the idea is disregarded by the student (I have personal experience with this, but you’ll have to wait for next week’s post to see what I mean!).

What will be the consequences of this falling-away of the social conservative movement? That is hard to say. It is difficult to calculate how fast the social conservative movement will fail. If it lasts a few more decades, the impact to the overall conservative movement will be minimal.

Do not take this the wrong way either. For the most part, I am a social conservative; therefore I do not want to see social conservatism fail. However, I am also a realistic person; I do not see the camp continuing on for much longer.

Given the possible outcomes for both the fiscal and social conservative camps, what is my general view of the future? Optimistic describes it quite well. Conservatism, as I have said many times before, embraces the individual. This philosophy is attractive to anyone who is not dogmatically intolerant. I believe the conservative movement will continue. What form it will be in, I will not reveal that here for fear of being dead wrong. Whatever the future holds, the underlying ideal of individual liberty will continue to support the movement for decades to come.

Your favorite 18-year-old conservative blogger,
Caleb

PS – Many people have asked me about what my opinion was about Referendums C and D the Colorado election on 11/1/2005. A friend of mine who shares a nearly identical opinion on C and D has a blog article on the subject. Go check it out!