This morning, the Hudson Institute’s Bradley Center for Philanthropy and Civic Renewal held the 2009 Bradley Symposium. The topic was “Making Conservatism Credible Again,” and it featured remarks by Rep. Paul Ryan and a panel moderated by AEI’s Arthur Brooks, which included two whip-smart observers awfully familiar around these parts — Rich Lowry and Yuval Levin. The whole event was edifying with very shrewd observations all around on a very pressing and timely topic. Video and audio will be available on Hudson’s website Friday. It would be well-worth your time.

But the feature attraction of the event as far as I was concerned was the presence Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels. Having spent a fair amount of time writing about and talking to people familiar with Daniels’ political achievements I have a gnawing suspicion that the more conservatives hear from him the more they’re going to like what they hear. Which is why I’ve jotted down a number of excerpts from Daniels’ remarks this morning for your appraisal.

On why the GOP must be forward-looking:

Emerson once wrote that in every polity there tends to be a party of memory and a party of hope. We must be, as we have been on our better days, a party of hope. Someone once said that conservatism is a Democracy including the dead. At least in my state the dead are a reliable Democratic constituency so I don’t spend much time campaigning to them. Let me just say that’s a wonderful phrase when it expresses our reverence for tradition, our understanding and commitment to fundamental, timeless principles. But in terms of making our beliefs credible, successful and credible in this country, our sights must be forward to the future. … In my view, we must, with respect to other Americans, direct ourselves to the young people this country. When we’re speaking to them, we are speaking to their parents and grandparents who want the best for them. But I think that it is a starting point for our recovery that we examine every issue and present every issue in terms of its implications for those who will soon inherit leadership of this country.

On the expanding scope of government:

When I step back even from the shock of current events and ask myself again … ‘Are Americans suddenly predisposed to forfeit hard-fought and hard-earned liberties that have proven themselves over and over again?’ I don’t see it. I can make the opposite case. The best educated people ever on the planet possessed of technology that we’ve never seen before – George Gilder has been writing brilliantly about this for twenty plus years – still possess a healthy American suspicion of bigness in all it’s forms: big business, labor and government. … I think such a people are less likely and not more likely than ever before to be herded by omniscient leaders into mass transit, smaller cars, labor unions or homogenized health care. I think those who are trying to squeeze Americans coercively into these boxes are the ones who are pushing water up hill.

On the need to connect with average Americans:

We must not only assert, but assert with credibility, that we understand what is going on in the lives of everyday people. Empathy is going to get a bad name here for a while if it’s going to be transported to the world of rule of law and jurisprudence, but empathy – which is what Adam Smith was talking about in the Theory of Moral Sentiments – is what distinguishes our species from the others. The ability to put oneself in the place and to feel deeply about the concerns, hopes, dreams and fears of other people is something that must visibly be a part of what we do. I like meetings like this – been to a lot of them. One of my friends described such things as “The leisure of the theory class.” Well, there’s a place for that. But if we are to become credible, if we are to achieve leadership through popular consent, we’re going to have to earn it. … People who wear the uniform I do politically have a very special burden, which is not shared by our opposition. You can be a silver-spoon, blue-blood, wind-surfing, coastal elite – but if you wear the Democratic label you are presumed to be connected and empathetic and to understand the problems of everyday people. Well, it’s unfair, it’s untrue, but it’s reality and it’s a reality we must deal with.

On the need for fiscal conservatism:

We must recover the fiscal high ground and it’s available to us. I tell you with certainty, concern about debt and deficit has not gone out of style – quite the contrary. Many Americans are more conscious of it today than they have been in a long time because they recognize it in their lives or the lives of a neighbor, or some business they were associated with, where people borrowed too much, spent too much, saved too little and are paying the consequences. We are seeing savings rates rise in America. That’s a conservative virtue, don’t forget. And I do believe that the terrifying deficits we are staring at, proposed by this administration — the threat that poses to every young person in this country presents an opening. But let’s face it: as a group of like-minded people, as a party, a lot credibility has been forfeited on that score in recent years. I think it will only return if we are prepared to engage in some grown-up conversation. I’m not a seasoned office holder, I’ve only ever run for or held one office and it’s the last one I’m going to hold, but I think I’ve got, after four-and-a-half years, enough evidence to say you can talk to Americans as adults. You don’t have to be afraid to do that.