Backbone Radio

Fortitude

Toughness, self-reliance, strength of character, and a fighting spirit. Have Americans still got it? Or are we a once great, now soft, people who used to have it? The 9/11 anniversary raises that question. The sheeplike demand of so many people for government to doctor them, raises that question. The readiness of countless parents for their children to be academically and morally formed in union-run schools raises that question. What kind of fortitude will it take for America to survive as a free society in a century when deadly enemies as well as the entropy of time conspire to take us down? I'll talk about it this Sunday with my radio guests including... Greg Scandlen of Consumers for Health Care Choices... Richard Brake of the American Civic Literacy Project... US Senate candidate Tom Wiens... Republican State Chairman Dick Wadhams... Colorado novelist Allan Harris... and Constitution Day organizer Dan Griffiths.

Yours for victory against jihad, JOHN ANDREWS

Sunday night classroom

Pencils ready, boys and girls? In order to have a good school year, you need to listen carefully to the word from on high. Senator John will be your instructor. Put away your regular textbooks and get out that special lesson plan from Acorn Publishing. Make note of the three most important words I say. Start composing your loyalty letter about "How I will help Senator John take over all of radio." What a happy time we'll have as my mesmeric voice beams into your home or car for the Sunday night classroom. What killjoys your parents are, for even suggesting that YOU might be excluded from the national group bonding experience that patriotic kids across the land are taking part in. But fear not, children. In this case the word from on high is not White House propaganda. It's clear thinking from atop the Continental Divide. And your instructor is not a liberal potentate empowered to withhold school funds and broadcasting licenses. He's just a legislative has-been with no captive audience.

In other words, attendance at the Sunday night classroom of Backbone Radio is voluntary. Listening is up to you; roll won't be taken. And in comparison with Obama's command performance in schools next Tuesday, we promise a lower pomposity factor and a higher truth quotient. Please tune in for...

** Noted educator Bill Moloney on the presidential teach-in... a Labor Day alert from Mark McKinnon of the Workforce Fairness Institute... and a rundown on Barack's radical advisers from Phil Kerpen of Americans for Prosperity.

** Plus a reality check on Afghanistan and Iraq with Daveed Gartenstein-Ross... and the stranger side of Colorado politics with Mike Littwin.

Awaiting those loyalty letters, JOHN ANDREWS

'If you can keep it'

Slated on Backbone Radio, Aug. 30 Listen every Sunday, 5-8pm on 710 KNUS, Denver... 1460 KZNT, Colorado Springs... and streaming live at 710knus.com.

"A republic, if you can keep it." That was Franklin's tart summation of the America we would inherit. His warning gains bite with each passing year, as affluence thickens and civic virtue thins. Fiscal indiscipline gnaws at us from within. This Sunday we'll talk about it with State Rep. Kent Lambert, newest member of the Joint Budget Committee. Enemies abroad are unrelenting, yet many leaders at home are unserious. Cliff May of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies will give us details.

** Schools and colleges, meanwhile, aren't forming citizens as they once did. American Council of Trustees & Alumni tracks this, with a new report we'll hear about from Charles Mitchell.

** Plus Joseph C. Phillips, our man in Hollywood, and Walker Stapleton, Republican businessman running for State Treasurer.

Can we keep the Republic? Though indications are mixed, there is new encouragement in this summer's upsurge of citizen resistance to the statist agenda. You are part of that, and so is our show.

Thank you for listening, JOHN ANDREWS

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