Our friend Timothy S. Goeglein's new book Stumbling Toward Utopia: How the 1960s Turned Into a National Nightmare and How We Can Revive the American Dream is a must-read analysis of when, how and why the United States of the Founding Fathers began to fray, and as it seems today, fall apart.
The premise of the book -- one that we wholeheartedly endorse -- is that the 1960s, and specifically the year 1968, is when the movement to fundamentally transform America into a post-constitutional state reached critical mass and began to implement the goals and objectives the Progressive Movement first articulated around the turn of the 19th to the 20th century.
This identification of late 19th, early 20th century Progressives as the philosophical and political progenitors of today's Far Left Democrats (and squishy Republicans or RINOs) has been examined by other conservatives, including CHQ Chairman Richard A Viguerie in his book TAKEOVER.
What distinguishes Tim Goeglein's treatment of the subject is the deft way that he maps the path of ideas, events and people to demonstrate that none of what is happening today is spontaneous or organic. Rather, it is the result of the fierce and relentless work of a relatively small group of revolutionaries bound together through shared backgrounds, education, philosophies, and social connections:
What happened in the 1960s, and continues to this day, did not occur overnight. It was the culmination of incremental efforts by determined progressives to remake America into something the Founding Fathers would not recognize.
One of the insights of Stumbling Toward Utopia is to expose the relentless nature of this revolutionary movement. For many conservatives and "normal Americans" politics is at best an avocation, not so for the Progressive Left.
As Mr. Goeglein explained:
The revolutionaries who brought us 1968 would continue moving into the school boards, government, academia, entertainment, and all other aspects of American life while the majority of Americans - the ones Richard Nixon titles "The Silent Majority" - repelled by what they saw, tries to catch a collective breath and recover some sort of normalcy.
But that normalcy never returned.
This desire “to catch a collective breath and recover some sort of normalcy” explains in large measure why Main Street America has ceded virtually every important cultural, political and religious institution to the Progressive Left.
One of the particularly useful elements of Stumbling Toward Utopia is how Tim Goeglein demonstrates that those behind today’s political crisis have been telling us of their intentions for decades in such documents as the Port Huron Statement, the 1962 Manifesto of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS).
Why does this forgotten-by-most-Americans screed by a bunch of 1960s campus radicals matter?
It matters because it outlines in some detail the principles behind practically everything Democrats are doing today to fundamentally transform America: The Marxist oppressor-oppressed division of American society, the push to collective management of resources and the means of production, advancing the sexual revolution to destroy the nuclear family, “democracy” rather than constitutional government, measuring corporate shareholder value by “environmental, social, and governance,” results, rather than profit, and more, are all there in the Port Huron Statement.
And as an aside, it is worth comparing the Port Huron Statement to the Sharon Statement, the statement issued a couple of years earlier as the founding document of Young Americans for Freedom, and asking yourself which appears to have achieved more practical application in today’s America.
Fortunately, for those of us who do not despair of saving the America the Founders envisioned but who often live in frustration that the Far Left Democrats appear to have a plan for the continued destruction of our country, while it appears conservatives have no plan for saving it, Tim Goeglein’s Stumbling Toward Utopia offers more than commentary, it includes what he calls “The Road Back From The 1960s Stumble.”
And it is really very simple: Start showing up and saying “NO,” and offering positive alternatives.
As Tim Goeglein concluded, “We must show up at school boards to expose and refute 1960s-inspired indoctrination. We must produce alternatives to the current entertainment fare. We must stop voting for personal and financial gain, but instead for our national welfare. We must continue to pledge allegiance to the flag and be good citizens, rather than complain about the state of our nation... It all starts with us. If we stop the downward slide of our nation started in the 1960s, it means we must engage, not disengage."
Timothy S. Goeglein is Vice President of Focus on the Family, his new book Stumbling Toward Utopia: How the 1960s Turned Into a National Nightmare and How We Can Revive the American Dream is available in bookstores now and online through Amazon and other retailers, we recommend it highly.
2024 Election
Stumbling Toward Utiopia
Timothy S. Goeglein
1968 Progressive Movement
Progressives
American institutions
silent majority
normalcy
Sharon Statement
Port Huron Statement
School Boards
National welfare
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