As we look to the way forward as conservatives, one fact is paramount:  American conservatism is about vastly more than the presidency.  The history of the modern American conservative movement was written in states and communities and in citizen activism.  Some of the highlights:

• Howard Jarvis’s Proposition 13 anti-tax revolt in 1978 began in California but incited a nationwide revolt against big government and high taxes.
• As a candidate for Governor in 1966 Ronald Reagan advocated welfare reform – thirty years before it passed in Washington.  For Reagan, welfare reform was part of his vision of “The Creative Society,” the premise of which was, as Reagan said at the time, was “government no longer substituting for the people, but recognizing that it cannot possibly match the great potential of the people.”
• In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Wisconsin Governor Tommy Thompson and Polly Williams, a Democratic state representative, pioneered school choice in Milwaukee.  As governor, Thompson, along with Michigan Governor John Engler and Utah Governor Mike Leavitt, also led the movement to reform welfare – a movement that began in the states and only later forced change in Washington. 
• As Mayor of Indianapolis in the 1990s, Steve Goldsmith opposed what he called the “bureaucratic monopoly” by pioneering the practice of having both private companies and government compete to deliver city services

The history of the conservative movement offers us a clear way forward today:  To renew, revitalize and relaunch the movement of Goldwater, Reagan and the Contract with America, we must concentrate our energies on all 511,000 elected offices in America, not just the presidency and Washington.   We need a movement far beyond Washington.  The oval office by itself is incapable of moving to a more conservative America.

What’s more, the current consultant and money dominated presidential campaign process is particularly ill-suited to moving conservatism forward.  The consultant class requirement that presidential campaigns begin two years before the voting guarantees that by the time a candidate gets into office her or she is two years out of touch with reality and the American people. Promises in February 2007 can’t accurately predict performance in February 2009. 

In addition to focusing on more than the presidency and presidential politics, four other points are critical to the future of conservatism.

First, American conservatism at its best has historically been about shaping a future based on freedom.  We should be the future oriented movement.  Our responsibility is to define a better future, and not just for some Americans but for all Americans.  We cannot ignore the moral challenge of those Americans who have been left out of the American dream.

Second, American conservatism at its best has always been focused on individuals, families and communities, not government.  Conservatives have to relearn a core principle of politics – the principle Ronald Reagan always understood – that issues must be addressed in a personal context first and only later in the historical and lastly, in the political context.  The first questions we must always ask ourselves are:  What will we do to help the American citizen?  How are our solutions relevant to your life?   This is not a formula for bigger bureaucracy. It is a formula for better policies.

Third, we are on the verge of extraordinary opportunities to dramatically improve public policies. Below are the seven principles of creating American solutions to help win the future:

1. There will be four-to-seven times as much new scientific knowledge in the next twenty-five years as in the last twenty-five years.
2. There is a customer market and values system which leads to dramatic change and innovation.
3. Pragmatism changing things now, to get things done is the classic American philosophy.
4. There are systems of productivity that are very powerful such as the Toyota production system, Six Sigma, the quality principles of Deming and Juran, the management principles of Peter Drucker, and concept of lean manufacturing.
5. Historic American culture as exemplified by George Washington and Benjamin Franklin simply works: the work ethic, courage, individual initiative, responsibility, team work, energetic effort, saving and investing, recognizing and rewarding achievement, having high expectations.
6. Insist that everyone be included and that a “new birth of freedom” (in Lincoln’s words) extends to every American.
7. You have a lot to contribute to your family, your life, and your community.

Fourth, American conservatism at its best has always understood that the American people have to force change on Washington.  Washington will not change itself.  The Washington environment is pro-government, pro-liberal, and pro-elite.  The American people, on the other hand, are pro-God, pro-English, and instinctively anti-bureaucracy.

• 91 percent of all Americans support the right to say “One nation under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance.
•  The Rasmussen poll reported that support for English as the official language was 85%. The Zogby poll had it at 84%.
• The American public believes that 51 percent of all federal spending is waste.  So by definition, any politician advocating a tax increase is advocating wasting more of the American peoples money.

The organization we are launching, American Solutions, is a deliberate effort to renew, revitalize and relaunch the Goldwater-Reagan-Contract with America movement by going back to its source: the citizen activist, communities and states that built the American conservative movement.

The premise of American Solutions is that politics as usual – focusing on what is wrong with the Left rather than what we can do for the country – will not bring about change.  We have to take the proven principles of conservatism – Ronald Reagan’s banner of “bold colors” – and translate them into bold solutions.  We need to build a movement  outside Washington based on these bold solutions.  Then and only then will we force conservative change on Washington.