A republic, but we can keep it? We can!
Five Andrews books to bring out the best in us
ONE: I’ve been learning to practice the politics of gratitude for eighty eventful years now, and what a journey it’s been. Where did the time go? When I first opened my eyes in May 1944, Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin were spurring the Allies to victory over the Axis powers. Then almost before I knew it, suddenly it was April 2024 and Donald Trump was gathering momentum to regain the presidency. Time to take stock.
Front Row: Eight Grateful Decades at the Political Parade is a sort of autobiography, revisiting the unforgettable moments and larger-than-life individuals that have defined the American experience in my lifetime. My career, an eventful interplay of politics, education, media, and ministry, taught me a lot of valuable lessons, often the hard way. I’m now concerned lest the beloved republic succumb to decline. We can’t allow that. Uniting as patriots, we can prove that America’s best is yet to come.
TWO: Imagine a citizen legislator whose freedom philosophy keeps bumping into the human dilemmas of civic virtue. That's my fictional alter ego George Leland, serving with the Covenant Party in the Senate minority at his state capitol in Hamilton.
Senator Leland Votes Aye is a collection of eight short stories. George turns up in a street story with Art Davis and a beach story with Brad King, a wedding story with Father Dominic and a school story with Win True. Earlier we saw him navigating a love story with Susan Washington and a movie story with Mike Loomis, a crime story with Clay Rice and a fake-news story with Lisa Kilgore. Here’s a book that challenges us to think deeper about what freedom is for.
THREE: We all live by stories. It was a close-knit family in the heartland which first stirred me to serve faith and freedom—and that’s ongoing. Bonded since boyhood with my younger brother Jim, we remained best of friends, even though living a continent apart. Reaching our seventies, unsure how much time either of us still had, we took a dare to retrace our divergent lives in a book of essays.
Downstream: An American Album is the result. So much river we’ve journeyed. Taking turns at lead oar, we reflect on our schooling and military years, marriage and careers, travels and travails. We keep religion and politics in the background, yet God’s hand on us is plain to see. Especially after Jim’s untimely death in early 2019, it’s the most personal of my books—and my most rewarding, for the life examined is more worth living. Who knows, maybe looking in on our self-exam will launch you on one of your own. ‘DOWNSTREAM’ ORDER NOW
FOUR: How can each of us apply the principles of America’s founding to issues of self-government in these tumultuous times? What’s it mean to be a conservative in the new political landscape? What would a right turn look like in your state?
My book Backbone Colorado USA: Dispatches from the Divide is a hundred short essays exploring those questions, as timely as this morning's news. Whether devouring it straight or munching it like popcorn, you'll savor this book.
FIVE: What are the ideals that have made the United States a beacon for the world? What’s ahead for an America that’s awaking to personal responsibility, finished with freedom on the cheap? What does "great again” require of you and me as citizens?
My book Responsibility Reborn: A Citizen's Guide to the Next American Century offers answers learned during 40 years in the arena.
Its rallying cry for Element R, a citizens movement transcending both parties, foresaw the seismic politics of 2016 and since. It belongs in your library!