Some 'Youth Meetings' The Media Ignores

...Norman Podhoretz, for example, writes, "I enjoyed speaking a t your conference in Cambridge, and I agree with you about the importance of bringing moderates of the left and moderates of the right together to discuss public affairs...

...James Buckley of New York has made a notable effort to speak out on some Qf the principle issues on which the White House has veered left, but at this point such efforts can hardly overcome the almost unanimous silence of other conservative leaders...

...the Women's Abortion Action Committee staged in Washington in November...

...While that approach may be useful in getting occasional appointments for political friends, where larger policy questions are concerned it would on the record seem to be almost completely mistaken...

...Louis offers another typical remark, this one of the Bloomington conference, "I was greatly impressed by the lecutres and discussion...

...In fact~ almost no one can read (fewer than five per cent...

...In large measure the President has been behaving the way he has because conservative leaders have assumed such a passive public attitude toward his leftward initiatives...

...These excuses and the underlying attitude they represent, however, are an integral part of the problems conservatives face, perhaps even a major part...

...But, unlike typical "youth culture" meetings, The Alternative conferences did not collapse into ideological bickering and tests of purity...

...The only way to forestall this is not to let anyone immigrate...

...Since the sheiks have 50-50 profit-sharing deals, all they and their people have to do is sit back and watch...

...The assumption of the congressional and other leaders who tell conservative rank and filers to support the President appears to be that, by staying close to the administration, withholding criticism, and not breaking party ranks, they can maximize their influence and help steer the White House on a conservative course...

...Although no new form of repression was discovered, no bombs thrown and no barricades manned, the three Alternative conferences were considerable successes, in that they brought together thoughtful people from all sorts of backgrounds, encouraged these thoughtful people to continue their defense of the beneficient aspects of the American system, and whenever possible - - t5 take the offensive...

...It will be the first post-postindustrial state...

...Or the pro-abortion rally...

...It's too bad the media's concern for sideshows distracts them from the legitimate student activities that endure in spite of the diminished fanfare...

...The President's continued assurance that he will have the support of these leaders, no matter what, makes it certain he will move left to absorb the insistent pressures pounding from that quarter...

...The excuses for this administration's performance offered by conservative Republican leaders would be bad enough if they were simply a species of mistaken commentary...

...So, will the 21st century become known as the Trucial Omanese century...

...of tourism adding still more impetus to Trucial Oman's spectacular economic growth brings to mind the possibility of currency problems...

...Most of the people involved, both students and lecturers, were exlremely pleased with the conferences, despite the fact that they were not rewarded with film coverage on NBC news...

...If you look at the newspapers but once a week you could hardly have missed their reports...

...All the economic growth is being generated and will continue to be generated by foreigners, aided perhaps by a few educated natives...

...The only real problem the emerging Trucial Omanese Supersheikdoms will face in the coming years is defense...

...I still believe it is in the best American tradition to speak out, even when it is in criticism of your own party's actions...

...The western conference was held in Carmel, California and featured three speakers from previous conferences, Professor Diamond, Marvin Peebles and Morton Blackwell...

...Norman Podhoretz, the editor of Commentary., led a thoughtful and lively discussion of the moral and political climate among intellectuals and Garrett Scaleria spoke about common sense and the common man...

...this would lower per capita income...

...Yet, perhaps .it is all for the best...

...I think nol...

...Participants at The Alternative c o n - ferences were serious students interested in the concepts of the American democratic system and the open society...

...The standard argument would be that the people of Trucial Oman will become fat and lazy and degenerate like us...

...Joe Duggan, a student in St...

...The Alternative sponsored these conferences and, as with everything else done by moderate students, conservative students and responsible liberal students, we managed to maintain an amazingly low profile with the media...

...Alexander Bickel, a contributing editor for The New Republic and a professor from the Yale law school, talked about repression in America, while Professor Robert Nisbet, sociologist at the University of Califonia, and a contributor to Commentary, Encounter, and the Intercollegiate Review, discussed his most recent book, Degradation of the Academ/2 Dogma...

...I doubt it...

...Will Trucial Oman be afflicted with this disease, thus cutting its growth rate...

...Maybe someone up lhere's trying lo tell us something...

...Will spoke on the relation of foreign policy to the open society and the importance of a sound foreign policy to democracy...

...Another feature atiraction in Bloomington was George F. Will, special assistant to Senator Gordon Allott and Washington columnist for The Alternative, who occasionally finds himself at odds with hard-line conservatives...

...In terms of public debate and articulate leadership, the Nixon administration has nearly decapitated American conservatism...

...Or the People's Party Convention in Dallas in December (it drew 200 of the peoole...

...There have been some countervailing efforts here in the House and freshman Sen...

...Since both Democrats and Republicans are suddenly wedded to liberal assumptions, the phenomenon noted by the National Observer emerges: The liberals win the point of principle by default...

...Instead, all participants emphasized the common element in their philosophies -- an underlying belief in the validity of the lraditions and principles of the American democratic system...

...In the recent monetary crisis, when all other currencies were moving up and down and causing trouble, the rial held firm...

...And it doesn't matter anyway, because by the year 2990, no one in Trucial Oman will have to work...

...by the year 2000, they will have a $20 million per capita income , and no one will work...

...One problem may "advanced" societies have suffered from in the past few years is educated incapacity...

...But Trucial Oman never had a Protestant Ethic in the first place...

...If this is done, and if some of the educated Omanese emigrate to the West (Trucial Oman is lacking in some minor amenities, like books) per capita income would go even higher...

...By promoting its own variant of liberal proposals and foreclosing Republican opposition, this administration has gone far to stifle ideological debate...

...The answer is no, because Trucial Oman has the one sure defense against educated incapacity: almost no one is t, ducated...

...Both the speakers and participants at the tl~ee conferences represented a cross-section of the American ideological speclrum - - representing such diversified groups as Young Americans for Freedom and the Young People's Socialist Alliance...

...The famous Trucial rial is one of the most stable currencies in the world...

...But did you read or hear about the three nation-wide conferences held this fall to study democracy and the open society...

...Studies underway at Hudson Institute indicate that there is probably less educated incapacity in Trucial Oman than anywhere else in the world (although Malawi is a close second...

...There was virtually no trading in the rial, so confident were its holders...

...when the country becomes rich, it will be easy to import everything needed for the 135,000 people...

...The cameras inevitably draw the frauds and there was simply no place for the entrepreneuers of revolution at these conferences...

...10 The Alternative February, 1972 and simple beauty in winter, when the air is bright and clear and rain has turned the desert green...

...They tell us, for one thing, that the "don't-make-waves" approach of conservative political leaders is precisely wrong...

...Nor were favorable comments limited to conference speakers...

...All Sheik Zaid has to do is push a button and whatever country is causing trouble becomes subsumed in oil...

...this is certainly a good sign for the country's future...

...The 95 per cent of the people wh,~ are now farmers, fishermen, heedsmen are on the whole unproductive...

...There is also another curious phenomenon here in the Washington landscape: The pervasive defeatism which afflicts the administration and its congressional Republican supporters...

...Does this mean that Trucial Oman will be forced to become a nuclear power...

...They were neither screaming leftist, threatening to liberate the solar system or Wallacite yokels...

...This is the true genius of Trucial Oman...

...When a Republican president proposes FAP, or a form of national health insurance, or a softening stance toward Communist China, the fundamental point the liberals want to make is removed from the realm of controversy...

...That is to say they are what the media considers h'relevant and booring...

...In his talk, entitled "The Perspective of the Framers, A Decent Regime Although Democratic" he provided valuable historical and political ineontinued on page 20 20 The A l t e r n a t i v e F e b r u a r y , 1972 CONFERENCES continued from page 10 sights into democratic traditions of the American Republic...

...Agreement was reached by students of widely divergent perspectives to work together to defend democratic process and the tactics of that defense were not neglected...

...Or what about the New York Times tale of the 400 (that's right, 400) "veterans of the New Left (who) voted to form a new group called The New American Movement" in Davenport, Iowa...

...Some 'Youth Meetings' the Media Ignores Baron Von Kannon D ID YOU READ the newspaper stories about the big Chicago meeting of The Emergency Conference for Young (an unacknowledged code word for left liberal) Voters last month...

...He is free to move as far left as he wishes in order to placate the liberals...

...In addition to Professor Diamond the east coast featured Professor Paul Weaver of Harvard's department of government discussing the role and responsibility of the press in a democratic society...

...What were the results of the three conferences...

...This, I fear, is one of the basic reasons why the public places us in such collective low esteem...

...Despite the fact that attendance at all fofir events fell far short of the announced goal, the media was there with cameras whirring, flash-bulbs popping and reporters scribbling trying their best to prove that the youth movement is still alive and still left-liberal...

...So, probably, would the qualitv of life -- there would be no "Abu Dhabi Review of Books" to get on people's nerves...

...Eugene Methvin, associate editor of Reader's Digest, spoke about the new revolution, not a violent radical revolution, but a revolution entailing a return to democratic principles...

...It is now in the process of developing a weapon more effective -and more fearsome -- than the nuclear bomb: an intercontinental guided oil slick...

...Discussion groups dealt with topics concerning both the theories and tactics on implementing the open society and fighting opponents of democracy on campus...

...Tibor Machan, who is associated with the objectivist-libertarian journal Reason also spoke...

...Participants at these gatherings, held in Bloomington, Indiana...

...The hard line turned to soft line overnight, only to wander back to hard line again when the immediate pressures eased...

...as the world becomes more ancl more "modern," it would somehow be appropriate that the premier parl of the world (at least economically) be governed on the principle of the divine right of sheiks...

...Cambridge, Massachusetts and Carmel, California, unfortunately do not fit into the "youth" stereotype that the media likes to porfi'ay...

...The famed Trucial Oman Scouts (numbering about 1,000) are gallant and tough fighters, but seem unlikely to be able to deter or defeat a determined invasion by a major power who wants to take over Trucial Oman and its wealth...

...The highlight of the midwestern conference was M. Stanton Evans who is editor of the Indianapolis News contributing editor to Human Events, chairman of the American Conservative Union, and, according to National Review's masthead, an "exalted editor" of that journal...

...Not necessarily...

...These are, I think, instructive episodes...

...In the West the collapse of the Protestant Ethic, of the work ethic, has been and is a serious matter...

...The eastern conference, held in Cambridge, was organized by John Moscow, a contributor to The Alternative and Bill Kristol, a senior editor...

...Professor Martin Diamond, a member of the government department at Northern Illinois University, con~ibutor to The Publ/c Interest, coauthor of The Demoeratw Republic and former organizer and campaigner for the Socialist Party, also spoke at Bloomington, delivering such a piquant lecture that he was invited to speak at the following east and west coast conferences...

...Trucial Oman may well be the first post-nuclear power...

...Since almost all of the noted conservative leaders have virtually stated they will not jump ship, even when the President engages in the most overt liberal initiatives, the President may assume he has the conservatives in his pocket...

...The performance of the conservative leaders is thus, in itself, a major contribution to the leftward drift of the administration...

...Well, none of the students voted to overturn the world, or even to build a new society...

...All Abbie Hoffman would have attracted would have been spitballs...

...In a political sense, therefore, this administration has left American conservatives bereft of big-name political leadership...

...My own belief is that the maintenance of democratic institutions in America depends upon the strength of the forces of the center, and conferences such as this have a contribution to make in helping the center to hold against the symbiotic onslaughts of the radical left and radical right...

...Evans warned of the dangers and challenges the radical left poses to the democratic system...

...With the evidence we have concerning the decisionmaking process i n the White House, such an approach amounts indeed to a virtual suicide pact for conservatives...

...All we can say is that present indications point that way...

...I have not and will not shirk from that role, regardless of the consequences...

...Whipping up an extravaganza which would do credit to the feats of Barnum, they brought forth a dazzling list of speakers and, after Saturday evening's lectures, held one of the most memorable meetings in the history of the Saturday Evening Club, featuring a string quartet and a reasonably priced bar...

...Only two developments could impede Trucial Oman on its way to Supersheikdomness...

...Trucial Oman will have crossed a new threshold in world history...

...But...

...This is just as effective as nuclear weapons -- and there is no fallout...

...This at least was the goal of the conferences...

...NATION'S PULSE continued from page 4 alarm' under President Johnson they now seem willing to point with pride to under a Republican President...

...But many did walk away with a better understanding of American society's validity, its shortcomings, the way it functions and how it can be improved...

...Are they any significant "counterv3iling forces" at work which may slow Trucial Oman's growth...

...One would be an influx of immigrants, attracted by the wealth...

...Other significant speakers and workshop leaders at the Bloomington conference included Morton Blackwell of the American Enterprise Institute, David Brudnoy, a libertarian professor at Northeastern University and regular contributor to National Review and The Alternative, Marvin Peebles, an attorney for the Philadelphia Model Cities Program, George A. Taylor, an Ohio State law student and Terry Krieger, a Harvard prize fellow and senior editor of The Alternative...

...Who can really tell...

...What has happened here in the House - - and in the other body - - has happened on a broader front to the conservative movement...

...But these should bo non-oxi~tent...