Tony Perkins, President, Family Research Council
Bucks County Conservative Examiner, Doreen Linder had a chance to interview Tony Perkins, President of Family Research Council, the sponsoring organization of the Value Voters Summit. He was very excited at the conference turnout and it exceeding his expectations. Two thousand showed up from all over the country to hear speakers such as Mike Huckabee, Bill O'Reilly, Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney, Star Parker, Mike Pence and House of Representatives Minority Leader John Boehner. Many more watched via the conference website on www.valuevotersummit.org
"People are engaged, energized, and looking for good candidates," said Perkins, "they though that Barack Obama was a moderate candidate but with his policies, he has revealed that he is radically to the left, not the center. Change was a desire, not moderate or left of center change but the right change." Perkins added that "August town hall meeting this year were not just about health care but about the direction our country is going in and how people don't like the direction it is going in." According last week's RealClearPolitics.com poll, 53% of Americans feel that the country is going in the wrong direction.
When asked about the recent ACORN scandal, Perkins replied, "The nut does not fall far from the tree," meaning President Obama. Obama was worked for ACORN as their Legal Counsel and as a Community Organizer. Perkins believes that because the political pendulum has been pushed so far to the left by the current administrations policies, that there is going to be a backlash that will make the opposition to those policies stronger.
Although Family Research Council has members from several political parties, Perkins specirfically mentioned that Republicans should represent all of their party, not just centralists and moderates. The next Republican candidate remains to be seen and should be one who is not just, "Conservative economically but socially as well." Whomever the candidate is in 2010, "They cannot turn their back on abortion"
Conferees where asked in a poll "Which issue is most important in determining your choice of candidate to support?" 597 of those who participated in the poll said abortion.
Mike Huckabee was the summit's choice to get the Republican nomination in 2012. Perkins said "When Huckabee spoke this weekend, it's as if he never walked away from his Presidential campaign. He is in touch with people through his many speaking engagements and his talk show." There is no official endorsement of Huckabee by the Family Research Council, but Perkins said, "He looks forward to talking with Huckabee in the upcoming months." Perkins also appeared last Sunday night on Huckabee's show on the Fox News Channel.
The next national gathering of Conservatives will be at the Conservative Political Action Conference,on February 18-20. More information can be found at www.cpac.org.
Pennsylvania Conservatives can also attend the Pennsylvania Leadership Conference in Harrisburg, PA. More information about that can be found at www.paleadershipconference.org.
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