Black State Senator Defends GOP

Black Louisiana Senator Elbert Guillory (R-Opelousas) explains why he switched from the Democrat Party to the Republican Party last year. He does a far better job summarizing the GOP's history on slavery and civil rights in a 4 minute video than most Republicans do in an entire political career: 

Caitlin Alcala: From Internships to Careers

Caitlin Alcala, Legislative Assistant for the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee, spoke with college students and DC summer interns on the value of internships in career building during the Institute's annual Intern Seminar last month in Washington DC.

The video below can also be viewed on YouTube.

Gabrielle Jackson: Coaching Millennials

Gabrielle Jackson, president of the Millennial Solution, coaches Millennials on how to optimize their talent and excel in their personal and professional lives. She is the author of Five Millennial Myths: the Handbook for Managing and Motivating Millennials. She offered insight and advice to young women attending the Institute's Intern Seminar in June 2014 in Washington DC.

Below is a video of her remarks:

Pavlich Book: Assault & Flattery

Townhall editor and Fox News's Outnumbered host Katie Pavlich has a new book out this week, and we heartily recommend it.

Assault and Flattery: The Truth About the Left and Their War on Women goes after the sacred cows of the so-called War on Women and exposes the truth about the liberal stance toward women on every major current issue, including abortion, self-defense, and the women's vote.

The timing of the book release couldn't be better.  The Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute is today honoring this dynamic conservative thinker and prolific writer with its 2014 Woman of the Year award.  We will have video of Katie's remarks as soon as it is available.

How Contraception Became Proxy for Women's Freedom

"Contra Justice Ginsburg, the Hobby Lobby decision is no cause for alarm," writes Helen Alvaré. She argues that even though Ginsburg's voice doesn't represent many women, "her arguments still have power" (particularly in the marketplace of male-female relationships), and they can't go unchallenged.

For significant and entrenched reasons, birth control has become a proxy for “women’s freedom” in the minds of many women, even if they’re not actually touched by the Hobby Lobby decision.

A significant number of women have good reasons to be anxious about the possibility of becoming pregnant when they are not fully willing and prepared. This is largely due to the situation in the “marketplace” of male-female relationships and the lack of policies helping mothers manage work outside the home.

First, regarding this marketplace, today it fosters non-marital sex, cohabitation, later marriage, abortion, and single parenthood (and thus female poverty). These phenomena are disadvantageous to women, and in the minds of many, can be mitigated or avoided by contraception. The mechanisms by which these results are produced are brilliantly summarized by leading economists.

SE Cupp: Turning Opinion into Careers

Political commentator S.E. Cupp offered tips and tricks of the trade on turning opinion into a variety of public policy careers during the Institute's annual Conservative Leadership Seminar in Washington DC in June. Below is a video of her remarks:

Growing Constitutional Crisis

"A growing crisis in our constitutional system threatens to fundamentally alter the balance of powers — and accountability — within our government," write liberal academic law professor Jonathan Turley (George Washington Law) and conservative U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wisc) in a Washington Post op-ed.

This crisis did not begin with Obama, but it has reached a constitutional tipping point during his presidency. Indeed, it is enough to bring the two of us — a liberal academic and a conservative U.S. senator — together in shared concern over the future of our 225-year-old constitutional system of self­governance. [snip]

In our view, the gridlock in Washington is not simply the result of toxic divisions. The dysfunctional politics we are experiencing may in part be the result of a deeper corrosion — a dangerous instability that is growing within our Madisonian system.

That dangerous instability concerns:

1. The growing shift of authority to federal agencies — "what is essentially a fourth branch of government" — that has "dramatically reduced [Congress's] ability to actively monitor, let alone influence, agency actions."
2. The refusal of courts to review constitutional disputes because of an overly constricted view of the standing of lawmakers to sue and other procedural barriers.
3. The rising share of federal spending that is not under [Congress's] control.