Backbone Radio

Independence Day 2008

Slated on Backbone Radio, July 6 Listen every Sunday, 5-8pm on 710 KNUS, Denver... 1460 KZNT, Colorado Springs... and streaming live at 710knus.com.

"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation." That's the first paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, America's birth certificate. We often skip over it to dwell on the second paragraph, with its timeless words about life and liberty, rights and government. But already in those opening lines, if you read them carefully, we find important teachings about the American worldview, as vital to our national identity today as ever -- but less and less honored in these times.

Asserted there, we can recognize (1) the sovereignty of the people, (2) immutable right and wrong, (3) a higher law than human codes, (4) the appeal to reason, and (5) mutual obligation and the Golden Rule. How different from current notions of relativism, post-modernism, situational ethics, radical personal autonomy, and the priesthood of judges.

So, happy Fourth of July. If all I do with this email is to urge you back to a fresh reading of the Declaration, that's a lot. If you can join us on the radio Sunday evening, that's better still. We'll talk about what America means as we always do -- Independence Day is year-round with us -- and we'll have a lineup of great guests to help us with that. Please be listening.

** Bill Kristol will size up the Bush legacy (Sunday is the President's birthday) and author Myrna Blyth will discuss her terrific book for parents, "How to Raise an American."

** Plus attorney Kent Holsinger on Ritter's battle against oil and gas production... columnist Mike Littwin on the presidential race... and former heavyweight boxer Ron Lyle on his mission to rescue Denver's inner-city kids.

When in the course of human events, your long holiday weekend is almost over and another working Monday is almost upon you, top off the independence celebration with three hours of flag-waving radio. Up in Backbone Colorado USA we love the national anthem and we accept no substitutes. If you agree, join us.

Yours for self-government, JOHN ANDREWS

Constitutional wins & losses

Slated on Backbone Radio, June 29 Listen every Sunday, 5-8pm on 710 KNUS, Denver... 1460 KZNT, Colorado Springs... and streaming live at 710knus.com.

"The Constitution means what the Supreme Court says it means," a cynic once said. Actually not. The Constitution belongs to we the people, not to our servant the government or any group within the government, even the honorable justices. We the people ultimately decide what it means. But effectuating that is harder than asserting it. So from day to day Americans as a free people have a lot riding on what the Supreme Court rules in key cases. Two huge ones have come down this month, the Heller case upholding gun rights a few days ago and the Boumediene case empowering enemy combatants on June 12.

Both have to do with the most fundamental demand that human beings can make upon their government -- the demand to be allowed to defend ourselves individually or collectively against hostile force and attack. Self-defense is one for two in the United States this month, or one for three if you count this week's ruling that disallowed Louisianans' effort to punish (and deter) child rape.

** On Backbone Radio this Sunday, I'll talk about the gun rights case with leading expert David Kopel of the Independence Institute. It was an important victory for liberty, public safety, and restraint of tyranny.

** We'll also analyze the enemy combatants case with Steve Emerson. No one understands radical jihadism better or fights it more fearlessly. That case was a bad setback for both national security and constitutional government.

** Plus Colorado politics with Peter Blake of the Rocky Mountain News, and a return visit from my Watergate friend Bud Krogh, author of "Integrity: Life Lessons from the White House."

How important is talk radio to the cause of individual freedom and limited government in our country today? Efforts from the left to muzzle us with the so-called fairness doctrine suggest talk radio is very important in this struggle. Our show is proud to be a part of it, and with your help, we'll not be silenced.

Yours for self-government, JOHN ANDREWS

Don't Europeanize the USA

Slated on Backbone Radio, June 22 Listen every Sunday, 5-8pm on 710 KNUS, Denver... 1460 KZNT, Colorado Springs... and streaming live at 710knus.com.

Will America become like Europe? That's one way of framing the epic battle between liberals or progressives and the common-sense conservative majority in this country. Voters who said no to Gore in 2000 and Kerry 2004 rejected abandoning American exceptionalism in favor of EU-style quasi-socialism and quasi-pacifism. We now face the same choice with Obama vs. McCain. The ten days I recently spent with Donna in Italy, England, and Germany, resulting in a couple of weekends off the radio, were sweet vacation and nothing else. Still I'm brimming with political observations from over there. We'll talk all about them this Sunday, June 22.

** And there's more. Grover Norquist will discuss his new book, "Leave Us Alone." Jessica Corry and Ward Connerly will have an update on Amendment 46, the ballot issue for true civil rights.

** State Sen. Chris Romer will tell us how the state and nation look through a Democrat's eyes as the campaign heats up.

** And we'll hear from Leondray Gholston of the Colorado Black Republicans about the splash he made at the GOP state convention.

You don't feel that far from home when there's a kid in a Carmelo Anthony jersey outside the Vatican gates and a bustling Borders & Starbucks up the street from Bristol's thousand-year-old cathedral. Yet the Old World is so different from our New World, and we came home more grateful than ever to be Americans. It'll take backbone to conserve what's unique and precious here. Hence our program.

Yours for the land of the free, JOHN ANDREWS

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