Subtitles section Play video
-
Imagine that you're a member of Congress.
-
You've worked very hard.
-
You've knocked on thousands of doors,
-
sweating and shivering, depending on the season.
-
You've made hundreds,
-
maybe thousands of phone calls to people you don't even know
-
asking for their support,
-
begging for their money.
-
And now you've got one of these.
-
It's hanging on a door in Washington, DC.
-
It says you're a member of Congress,
-
that you represent the people of your state.
-
Now, imagine you're a conservative member of Congress.
-
For some of you here in Boston, Massachusetts,
-
that's going to take a powerful imagination, all right?
-
(Laughter)
-
But imagine with me
-
that you're a conservative member of Congress.
-
You grew up on Milton Friedman.
-
You love his free markets,
-
free enterprise and free trade.
-
You've watched Ronald Reagan's farewell address over and over,
-
and you cry every time --
-
(Laughter)
-
he gets to the part about the shining city on the hill,
-
and how if the city had to have walls,
-
the walls had doors --
-
doors to let in those yearning to breathe free.
-
You get goosebumps when you think of him telling Mr. Gorbachev
-
to tear down his wall.
-
You're a conservative member of Congress,
-
and you agree with President John F. Kennedy
-
that America is an exceptional place.
-
For inspiration,
-
you go to YouTube and you watch his speech at Rice University,
-
September of 1962,
-
the "moon shot" speech.
-
And you're amazed that he admits in that speech --
-
a speech of 17 minutes of pure American exceptionalism --
-
that some of the materials needed for the spacecraft
-
hadn't been invented yet.
-
No matter.
-
We're going to the Moon before the decade is out.
-
You agree with him
-
that the vows of this nation can be fulfilled
-
only if we in this nation are first
-
and therefore we intend to be first.
-
You've taken as your own the affect that he so embodied.
-
That when leaders are optimistic,
-
they're saying they believe in the people they represent.
-
You're a conservative member of Congress,
-
and you believe in the precautionary principle.
-
You believe in data-driven analysis.
-
You know that climate change is real and human-caused,
-
and you see in climate change
-
a silent and slow-moving Sputnik moment.
-
One that calls for the greatness of your nation
-
as much as the original Sputnik moment.
-
You are a conservative member of Congress.
-
You high-five the memory of Jack Kemp,
-
and believe with him
-
that the test of conservatism is that it works for everyone,
-
regardless of skin color.
-
You're appalled by the alt-right.
-
You want them to have nothing to do with your brand, your party, your legacy.
-
You utterly reject them.
-
You --
-
(Applause)
-
You're a conservative member of Congress.
-
You rise with compassion to protect the lives of the unborn,
-
but otherwise you think the bedroom of consenting adults
-
is a rather strange place for the government to be.
-
You are a conservative member of Congress.
-
With John Adams,
-
you fear the mob.
-
Because you know, as he knew,
-
that a mob is not able to protect liberty,
-
not even its own.
-
And you're amazed at the wisdom that he and other framers had
-
in establishing a slow, deliberative governing process --
-
an inherently conservative governing process.
-
It would serve a country.
-
It would grow far greater than they could ever imagine.
-
You are a conservative member of Congress.
-
You fear the fire of populist nationalism,
-
because you know that those who play with fire
-
can't control it.
-
You see their pitchforks and torches,
-
and you know they're not good building tools.
-
The pitchforks and torches can tear down and burn up but they can't build up.
-
They can't build up the institutions and the communities
-
so necessary to a stable and prosperous country.
-
You're a conservative member of Congress,
-
and you fear the next county party convention.
-
You so wish for your party to be the grand opportunity party,
-
not the grumpy old party.
-
(Laughter)
-
You know that they want to hear from you some old saw
-
about how a secret Muslim, non-American socialist took over in the White House
-
and destroyed the country,
-
and you know that none of that's true.
-
(Applause)
-
You know that they want to hear your say that you're OK with insults,
-
OK with "lock her up" chants
-
and OK with policy pronouncements
-
with all the sincerity and thoughtfulness that 140 characters can muster.
-
You are a conservative member of Congress.
-
You realize that many in your party look to some good old days
-
that you know never existed.
-
They hold on, for example,
-
to the fossils that fueled the last century of growth,
-
but you know that better, cleaner more abundant fuels await us,
-
and you know that that abundance can lead the world to more energy,
-
more mobility
-
and more freedom.
-
You're a conservative member of Congress.
-
You realize that many in your party pine for the '50s and the '60s
-
because those were, after all, the good old days.
-
But you know that the Cuyahoga River was on fire back then.
-
You know that in Pittsburgh,
-
street lights came on at noon because of the soot in the air.
-
The schools were segregated,
-
neighborhoods redlined,
-
that communism threatened freedom,
-
and if you got cancer, you weren't likely to fight for long.
-
You're a conservative member of Congress
-
and you want to sound like JFK at Rice,
-
where JFK said, "It's understandable
-
why some would have us stay where we are
-
a little bit longer,
-
to wait and to rest."
-
But everything within you says with him,
-
this city of Houston,
-
this state of Texas,
-
this country of the United States was not built by those who waited
-
and rested and wished to look behind them.
-
You are ready to lead.
-
You are ready to prove the power of free enterprise
-
to solve challenges like climate change.
-
You are ready to lead.
-
So I've got a suggestion for you then:
-
lead ...
-
now.
-
Step out,
-
step up.
-
You know, we ask America's best
-
to die on literal hills
-
in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.
-
Is it too much to ask you to die a figurative death
-
on a political hill in Washington, DC?
-
You know, at the end of your time in Washington,
-
they're going to take this plaque off the door.
-
They're going to hand it to you;
-
you're going to go home with it.
-
Can you imagine the emptiness of knowing that you stood for nothing,
-
that you risk nothing,
-
that all you did was follow fearful people to where they were already going
-
rather than trying to lead them to a better place?
-
If you're not willing to lose your seat in Congress,
-
there's really very little reason to be there.
-
(Applause)
-
So here's the thing:
-
it's not too late.
-
There's still time to lead.
-
Speak out,
-
speak up,
-
call lunacy what it is:
-
lunacy.
-
Tell the American people that we still have moon shots in us.
-
Tell the folks at the county party convention,
-
"You bet free enterprise can solve climate change."
-
Tell them that Milton Friedman would say to tax pollution
-
rather than profits.
-
Tell them that it's OK --
-
no, it's a good thing
-
that progressives would agree.
-
Tell them the very good news that we can bring America together
-
to solve these challenges and to lead the world.
-
Tell them that free enterprise can do these things.
-
Tell them that America must stop the dividing,
-
and must start the uniting.
-
Tell them.
-
Play your part before it's too late.
-
(Applause)
-
Thank you very much.
-
(Applause)