Americans for Prosperity (AFP), held their fourth annual “Defending the American Dream” summit in Washington, D.C. last weekend, which happened to coincide with Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor Rally.”
Friday welcomed over 3000 attendees from every state in the union, including over 500 from Virginia. Several buses from Roanoke and the surrounding counties trekked to the nation’s capitol for the two day event.
The morning featured several breakout sessions and grassroots training for youth and college students. The afternoon was given over to the welcome by AFP President Tim Phillips, who was followed by a slate of speakers. Phillips’ new slogan, “November is Coming,” is an obvious reference to the upcoming elections, which conservatives are pinning their hopes on.
He said of Congress, “Keep voting Yes on more spending and more taxes and we are voting No in November.” He blamed what he calls the mainstream media for the four stages of the conservative movement — “First they ignore us, then they ridicule us, then they attack us and then we win.”
Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell congratulated Virginians on having over 35,000 AFP members in the state, with over 1.2 million AFP members nationwide. He compared Virginia, which has a budget surplus, to Washington, which is trillions of dollars in debt. McDonnell emphasized his focus on de-regulating the state versus the federal government, which is adding 60,000 new pages of regulations every year.
The Tribute to Ronald Reagan dinner featured a slide show on the former President, along with a selection of his most famous quotations. Congresswoman Michele Bachman of MN startled the crowd with the fact that President Obama has put the country more in debt in the past 12 months than the previous 43 presidents put together. She said “if Cap & Trade passes, our electric bills will double overnight,” and urged everyone to contact their representative to express their views on what she termed “this job killing tax.”
Conservative columnist George Will was the keynote speaker. He peppered most of his remarks with sports analogies, which went over well with the crowd. He quipped, “Obama is Jimmy Carter 2.0 and we need to hit delete.”
He spreads the blame around to both Republicans and Democrats alike for getting the country into the position it is currently in, saying, “Republicans are faulted for TARP, 0% down mortgages and the No Child Left Behind Act. The Democrats are making it worse by taxing the rich and stopping economic growth. We have too many takers and not enough makers.”
He pointed out that in 1916, as the richest man in the country, John D. Rockefeller could have written a personal check to cover the entire debt of the nation. In 2010, Bill Gates is the richest man in America and he could only write a personal check which would cover two months of interest payments.
Radio talk show host Herman Cain had perhaps the best quote of the day for all Americans: “Stay united, stay informed and stay inspired.”
For more information, visit www.americansforprosperity.org.
By Carla Bream [email protected]