The New American Revolution

HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Chapter One

The New American Revolution

Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of patriotism more than any appellation derived from local discriminations.

-- George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

The reelection of George W. Bush on November 2, 2004, was a confirmation of what began on September 11, 2001 -- a New American Revolution.

That national election was not simply a culmination of the changing of our nation, but a continuation of that change in the most personal and individual ways. One by one, person by person, there has been a shift in how Americans view themselves and what we're willing to put up with.

We're tired of cleaning up the world's messes. We're tired of waiting for Europe to deal with terrorists and tyrants. We took it upon ourselves to deal with them in the only way possible -- with righteous vengeance and preemptive action.

The American Left complains that we have no right to be the world's police force. On the contrary. We've been the world's janitor for almost a century, and after September 11, it became obvious it's better, safer, and more productive to change things instead of cleaning up after the mess.

I contend our DNA changed on September 11. As the years pass and we adjust to what has been called the "New Normal," we may not think about those tragic events every day, but we have been forever changed personally. We no longer take our freedom for granted. We looked into the face of a savage and realized evil does exist. We now understand that beasts nurtured by the rest of the world don't care about justice, compassion, or freedom.

We finally understand at our very core that tomorrow is not guaranteed. We "get it" that decisions we make today will shape the world of tomorrow. With all at stake, our individual consciousness as Americans and our responsibility to the future are now irreversible.

Despite the results manifesting all around us, the depth of this change and its consequences have gone largely unrecognized. Americans, even under attack, have been principally a people desirous of being left alone, reticent to go to war.

In the last century, more than half a million Americans died fighting two world wars brought to us by the fascist hubris of Europe and Asia. Now a new century revealed the face of a new savage from the Middle East. There is a point, even for the most restrained, when enough is enough.

I contend September 11 was the beginning of America's tipping point. The subsequent exposure of the deep depravity of the American Left reinforced what is now a New American Revolution.

After that consuming tragedy in 2001, the American Left wallowed in its favorite self-obsessed "It's all our fault!" jingle. The Hate America First crowd, ranging from Michael Moore to Bill Maher to Sean Penn, whined that the only way America could deal with terrorism was to fix "why they hate us."

Instead, the power of the individual American emerged. It became apparent that the Left's decades-long effort to condition us to hate this country is failing. The strength of the American character survives. Instead of worrying about the hurt feelings of the Inner Child of Islamist terrorists, we decided to invade their countries, kill or capture the tyrants and terrorists, and liberate the people who for far too long had suffered under despotic regimes.

Our transformation from a passive, guilt-ridden nation drowning in Leftist moral relativism was actually already in motion when we elected George W. Bush president in 2000.

The defeat of Al Gore that year was a message from a nation that ultimately was deeply disgusted by Bill Clinton. We realized we had a choice about whom we wanted to emulate -- a man so easily able to lie, betray, and harm those closest to him, or someone who was, at his core, decent.

When the chips were down, we came through, wanting a better role model. And thank God we did. Much of the rhetoric on both sides of the political spectrum was that the 2004 election was the most important in our lifetime. Little did we know that it was actually the 2000 election that would determine the course of our world.

George W. Bush was the right man at the right time. He, like us, is a product of a time when Americans had to decide to put up or shut up. On September 10, 2001, George W. Bush and this nation as a whole were very much like a Popeye who had sworn off spinach.

You see, the American Individual is a Regular Guy with a Special Power. For Popeye, his secret was spinach. For us, it is something invisible and infused in our very being -- understanding of and love for freedom and liberty. We are the world's first descendants of an idea. We are the only place on earth where identity is not based in the mass identity of geography. Instead, we are the stewards of an idea rooted in individualist freedom and opportunity.

And yet, because of decades of Leftist hectoring, America toward the end of the twentieth century had begun to doubt itself and its greatness. In my first two books, The New Thought Police (NTP) and The Death of Right and Wrong (DRW), I chronicle our successful brainwashing by the American Left. We were slowly succumbing to the lie that America was a racist, sexist, homophobic place. American values and culture were the scourge of the world, socialism was the wave of the future, and Americans were conditioned to look away.

We began to allow multiculturalism and moral relativism to win the day.

When I wrote those books I had no idea how near we were to a New American Revolution. But I should not have been surprised. Americans have . . .

Excerpted from The New American Revolutionby Tammy Bruce Copyright © 2005 by Tammy Bruce. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.