Dear Newsletter Subscriber,

The Conservative Bookstore welcomes you to the world of conservative ideas. In the Fresh News department, Dave Kopel and Paul Blackman have recently released their new book, "No More Waco's: What is Wrong with Federal Law Enforcement, and How to Fix It". Next weeks newsletter will include an exclusive interview with Dave Kopel. The book can be ordered from our politics page which you should be able to reach by clicking on the line of code below:

http://www.conservativebookstore.com/politics.html

It is our firm promise to keep you abreast of new developments in the field of Conservative letters. This week our discussion revolves around history. Some are bored with such things, but if you keep reading you will see why such knowledge is not only important, but exciting.

When history was first recorded it was a mere narrative, a story about what had happened in the affairs of men, usually it attempted to glorify some deed or other. Soon men began to realize that certain events seemed to occur and reoccur. It was then that history came to have a function beyond mere story telling, it could be used to gauge what might happen in the future.

In the last few years we have seen this trend intensified to the point where historians now purport to be able to telescope events of the past into the future with some degree of precision. We know that historical economic data has long been used by governments and banks to make decisions on the economy. It is true that, even armed with historical information, these decisions and predictions are not always correct. (Usually because they have not taken all factors into account.) However, much of the time they are correct. Thus, it would seem profitable to look at ways to project other aspects of our history into the future to see where we are headed and precisely how we might prepare for that future.

Several recent books address this topic in some detail. Perhaps the most sensational is "The Fourth Turning", by Neil Howe and William Strauss. This book reviews American History since the mid-seventeenth century. In our history they find that we have gone through several cycles, each one comprising of four periods which the authors designate as "turnings". These turnings are specifically tied to various generations of our society:

1.A high point of culture and society occurs where a generation that has just emerged from crisis strengthens its social institutions. Most recently this would have been the stable period that occurred in the late 40's and early 50's.

2.Next there is an awakening as a new generation comes of age and challenges the old system. This can be seen in the sixties and seventies.

3.As old and new ideas and morays come into conflict an unraveling occurs that destabilizes society.

4.And finally the cycle culminates in a Crisis. In the past there have been three major crises. These have been the American Revolution, The Civil War and finally the Great Depression in conjunction with the Second World War.

Messrs. Howe and Strauss hypothesize that we are presently at the end of an unraveling and are about to embark upon a crisis. In their book they spell out in detail previous cycles in our history and how we dealt with them. They also conjecture on what the nature of the coming crisis might be.

You may order this book by clicking on the line below:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=055306682X/theconservativebA/

From this interesting hypothesis we turn to American foreign policy which is examined in depth by Walter A. McDougall in his landmark work, "Promised Land, Crusader State: The American Encounter with the World since 1776". Mr. McDougall examines eight traditions in America's dealings with the outside world. In the 19th century he identifies four:

1. Exceptionalism: liberty at home, not crusades abroad.

2. Unilateralism

3. The American System: the Monroe Doctrine.

4. Expansionism: Manifest destiny.

These form a kind of Old Testament Bible by which our nation operated for over 100 years, and all in all stood us in good stead.

The Book identifies four more traditions that have developed since the turn of the century.

5. Progressive Imperialism: Expansion for the benefit of others.

6. Wilsonianism: We become in our own eyes world saviors.

7. Containment:

8. Global Meliorism: Foreign Policy as Philanthropy.

These form a New Testament Bible which has become our modern way of dealing with the outside world.

By analyzing these traditions and looking at the results they attained we can see which policies will be effective in the future. Mr. McDougall has his opinions on this matter (he tends to favor the old testament over the new) and expresses them profoundly in his book, which may be ordered by clicking on the code below:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=0395830850/theconservativebA/

Finally, In this same tradition is David Hackett Fischer's book, "The Great Wave". This book researches price revolutions that have occurred in Western Economies since the Renaissance. The waves are an alteration between drastic price inflation and relative stability. This well researched volume with vast appendices backing the conjectures shows that we are just ending an extended period (several decades) of price inflation and are entering a period of relative stability. His research quite exhaustively lays out the past waves and explains them as a phenomena not wholly within the realm of any single economic theory.

This work has relevance for anyone interested in history, economics or investing. To order click on the code below:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ISBN=019505377X/theconservativebA/

Admittedly the art of using history to predict the future is not an exact science. It has been used unsuccessfully in the past. For example it was Karl Marx's theory of the class struggle which predicted the downfall of capitalism. He failed to take into account capitalism's ability to increase the productivity of workers and capital that thus provides for the best possible world system. In any case, we must also ask ourselves how does the Fourth Turning prediction of crisis in our near future square with Fischer's prediction of long term stable prices. This question I leave for you to answer. Please write to the newsletter with these answers and other issues. Your letter may be included in the next newsletter at the discretion of the editorial staff.

Thanks for being a part of the Conservative Bookstore Newsletter. Please visit the bookstore often. Don't forget, next week we have our interview with Dave Kopel. His opinions on such matters as the recent indictments in Idaho regarding the Ruby Ridge incident will be quite interesting.

Sincerely,

All the staff at:

newsletter@conservativebookstore.com