Why We Whisper: Restoring Our Right to Say it's Wrong - Hardcover

Jim DeMint has proven himself not only an able senator, but a thinking senator. His book, written with David Woodard, exposes the great cultural divide in America today in a winsome way, and offers some very refreshing and constructive suggestions for Christians and right-thinking citizens to restore truth and balance to a culture nearly out of control. Jim DeMint and David Woodard have made an excellent contribution to the debate of today's great issues.--Chuck Colson, founder, Prison Fellowship

Americans today live in the greatest nation the world has ever known. Never before has a country been the producer, and beneficiary, of so much wealth and freedom. But with great success comes even greater responsibility. Part of the American legacy is to pass our values to our posterity, as well as to future generations in other nations. To meet this responsibility, the next generation must understand what made America great, what is working, what is not working, and how to improve all the ideas that contributed to past success. No factor is more important in this task than our freedom of speech. This right is both a means and an end to improving and strengthening the nation. Why We Whisper is about free speech in America, but not 'freedom of speech' as it is often defined today. It is not the freedom to practice destructive behavior or to produce obscene material. This book is about freedom of speech as it was intended by the visionaries who designed the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The First Amendment empowers Americans to join the public and political debate with their ideas and values, including those traditional ideas and values that have made America great. This fundamental freedom is under attack, and unless principled Americans fight back, our grandchildren and future generations around the world will receive a greatly diminished inheritance. United States Senator Jim DeMint and Professor David Woodard compellingly demonstrate that through court rulings, bureaucratic pronouncements, and well-intentioned, but ultimately unhelpful laws, secular values have allied with government authority to dismantle the ideals of a moral and decent nation. A country once confident of its values and optimistic about its future is now pessimistic, nervous, and confused. Traditional American institutions like the Boy Scouts, churches, businesses, college campuses, and public schools are routinely targeted for attack and government regulation. As a result, morally responsible, patriotic Americans are forced to withdraw into the shadows of public opinion, where their freedom of speech is reduced to whispers. The positive influences and societal protections of tradition are routinely ignored by the new secular elites who have been ensconced with government power and are now anxious to advance their agenda. Americans have watched as moral relativism and secularism savaged education, law, religion, business, and traditional notions of proper behavior. If government allows, protects, and even subsidizes destructive behavior, social problems will lead to the decline, and ultimately the fall, of the United States. The authors warn that Americans must no longer allow this cultural decline. We must expect and demand government to promote positive behavior that is aligned with our historical and cultural principles. Those in authority must not only encourage but listen to, embrace, and institutionalize the whispers of the muzzled majority of Americans, and rediscover the values that made the nation exceptional in the first place.