The Ripon Society, Washington D.C., DC (2026)

09/01/2026

TEDDY TWEET OF THE WEEK

“Be practical as well as generous in your ideals. Keep your eyes on the stars but remember to keep your feet on the ground.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Address at Groton School
May 24, 1904

08/31/2026

Inflation is the tax you never voted for. Cultural commentator John Mac Ghlionn on how decades of Washington overspending quietly picked every saver's pocket — and why the American Dream now feels out of reach in the latest Ripon Forum:

Over the whole sordid scene hangs the national IOU. Federal debt passed $39 trillion this spring, near $289,000 for every household. Interest alone now runs past a trillion dollars a year, the third-largest item in the budget, behind only Social Security and Medicare. Children too young to vote have inherited the bill for a party they were never invited to, and the band keeps playing. Every dollar sent to lenders is a dollar that cannot lighten a tax bill or stay in a worker’s wallet.

None of this fell from the sky. Washington helped engineer the crisis. Open-ended federal lending gave colleges every reason to raise prices, and they obliged. Federal and local rules made building homes slow and costly, so supply lagged demand and prices did the rest. Years of spending past revenue debased the dollar in everyone’s pocket, the cruelest tax of all, because it falls hardest on the saver and never appears on a ballot.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/is-the-american-dream-still-within-reach-no/

08/25/2026

TEDDY TWEET OF THE WEEK

“It is always easy for an individual or a party to make promises; the strain comes when the party or individual has to make them good.”

Theodore Roosevelt
Before Civil Service Reform Association
Baltimore, Maryland
February 23, 1889

08/21/2026

Is the American Dream dead? Not even close.

The Cato Institute’s Adam N. Michel makes the case in the AMERICA250 Special Edition of the Ripon Forum: mobility today is holding steady with prior generations — and the odds it continues are good:

On top of that, costly regulations and minimum wage laws price low-skilled workers out of legal work, and occupational licensing requirements make ordinary trades unattainable without hundreds of hours of training.

Loosen some of these government-imposed barriers to opportunity, and the American system could outperform its already good track record.

The future is bright. AI is already lowering the barriers to skilled work, and letting start-up firms reach more customers with new products in record time. Despite the doomerism, technology has historically been a net job creator. It makes workers more productive and opens opportunities faster than it closes them.

The American Dream isn’t fading. It’s being lived right now, at roughly the same rate as prior generations. The odds it continues are good.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/is-the-american-dream-still-within-reach-yes/

08/20/2026

Back in February 2008, former Michigan Governor John Engler, then heading into his role atop the National Association of Manufacturers, made the case in The Ripon Forum for why America can't afford to play games with the R&D tax credit:

Last spring U.S. Representatives Sandy Levin (D-MI) and Dave Camp (R-MI) introduced legislation to further strengthen the credit, and make the R&D tax credit permanent. In 2007, there were a record-breaking number of original cosponsors on the bill, all of whom are members of the House tax-writing committee in Congress, reinforcing the broad bipartisan support for innovation in Congress. Given that support and the R&D tax credit’s proven effectiveness, how is it that Congress allows it to expire – now for the unlucky 13th time? It’s not as if the legislators do not hear from their business constituents and trade associations, including the Information Technology Association of America, the Business Software Alliance and, of course, the National Association of Manufacturers.

Unfortunately, the research and development tax credit is so popular, so effective, that it has become a favored bit of legislative sweetener. It gets added to this measure or that, often in the waning days of a Congressional session, to attract a few more votes. When the credit lapses, the business community hears assurances like, “We’ll get it done…eventually. Don’t worry.”

But manufacturers and businesses in the United States do worry. They worry when they open the paper to a full-page advertisement meant to lure companies abroad; when they start to plan a product’s development, not knowing whether a credit will be in place; when they learn of a foreign competitor’s breakthrough and great new product, developed through government-encouraged R&D.

In today’s global economy, competition is a given and complacency the enemy. The time has come to recognize the R&D tax credit as a critical element of American competitiveness, one that should be a permanent feature of the U.S. tax code. It’s the smart thing to do.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/incentive-and-inventive/

08/19/2026

From Jeanette Rankin to Sandra Day O'Connor to Katie Britt — Republican women have been breaking barriers since before the 19th Amendment. Independent Women President Carrie Lukas on why America's 250th is a moment for women to celebrate:

The conservative movement, proudly, rejects the kind of identity politics that elevates people based on their s*x, race or other characteristics. Yet that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t loudly applaud women who have earned their positions and are at the very top of their professions. These women show that meritocracy works.

Republicans have demonstrated that they are, in fact, the party that champions women. Democrats prioritized the perspective and sensibilities of men who claim a female identity over actual women, putting women’s safety and basic fairness at risk.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/women-especially-republican-women-have-much-to-celebrate-at-americas-250th/

08/18/2026

TEDDY TWEET OF THE WEEK

“Government by the people means that the people have the right to do their own thinking and to do their own speaking about their public servants.”

Theodore Roosevelt
The Kansas City Star
April 6, 1918

08/17/2026

The GOP was founded to end slavery. Frederick Douglass called it home. Lincoln led it to war for freedom. That history isn't a footnote — it's the foundation. Former presidential Advisor Ja'Ron Smith on why the Republican Party never abandoned Black America:

Yet today, the relationship between Black Americans and the Republican Party is often framed as a contradiction. That framing does a disservice to history and to the millions of Black Americans whose values — faith, family, entrepreneurship, community, patriotism — align naturally with conservative principles. The Republican Party did not abandon Black America.

But honest conservatives must reckon with the political distances created over the twentieth century, even as the party’s founding DNA has never changed.

America 250 is a moment to recommit to that founding promise — and President Trump is delivering on it. The largest tax cut in American history is already securing increased purchasing power for countless American families. His administration has advanced school choice and expanded access to trades, ensuring every student has a path to success while empowering parents to demand better and never leave a child trapped in a failing system. And on housing, President Trump stands on the brink of monumental policy — the first of this generation — that will make the dream of homeownership a reality for families who have long been locked out.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/americas-unfinished-promise-black-americans-and-the-republican-party/

08/14/2026

We ran up more debt in peacetime than we did fighting WWII — and we did it while barely blinking. The Brookings Institution's Jessica Riedl on the $200 trillion question nobody in Washington wants to answer in the latest Ripon Forum:

And the fiscal outlook is only growing more daunting. Simply extending current policies would drive the debt past 240 percent of the economy within three decades. Soaring interest costs are projected to consume nearly one-third of all federal taxes within a decade, and between 54 and 83 percent — depending on interest rates — within three decades.

Past wars and economic crises were expensive but temporary, and lawmakers and voters made sure to return to fiscal responsibility afterward. Today’s surging deficits are driven by our insatiable appetite for European-style government benefits at low tax rates. Never before have Americans run up so much debt in peacetime while caring so little.

Sure, voters tell pollsters they would prefer smaller deficits—right after their elected officials finish cutting their taxes and expanding their benefits. When pressed, many cling to hyper-partisan myths that blame the deficit entirely on their favorite political targets. Liberals blame tax cuts for the rich and “forever wars.” Conservatives blame immigrants, foreign aid, and fraud. Those costs are real but relatively minor contributors to deficits projected to reach $200 trillion over three decades. Our deficits result primarily from Social Security and Medicare, which face a 30-year cash shortfall of $157 trillion. And we keep demanding tax relief, even as the median-earning family now pays an effective federal income tax rate of just 2 percent.

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/article/americas-national-debt-andthe-future-of-the-american-experiment/

08/13/2026

In 2021 remarks to The Ripon Society, pollster Ed Goeas has a warning for GOP candidates gearing up for the midterms: stop campaigning against the other guy — start campaigning for something:

“Having a hardcore 60% of Republicans with very few independents and no Democrats is not something to build a party back on. We have to start reaching out to these various groups. Unfortunately, that’s where Trump keeps sticking his nose in. He is not doing what a president usually does, which is go away for a period of time, let things quiet down, and not seem critical of his replacement in the White House. It’s making it very difficult for us to rebuild. But, one of the things I think Republicans need to understand that I wish Trump, or at least the people around him, understood is if Trump ran again in two years, he would win the Republican nomination. He would win the Republican nomination, but it would be almost impossible to win the general election.”

“Don’t get caught in the trap of going after what the Democrats are doing. Voters need to hear what we’re for, not what we’re against, and that we are focused on fixing the problems they face every day and making their lives better.”

READ MORE: https://riponsociety.org/2021/07/voters-need-to-hear-what-were-for-not-what-were-against/

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