What does it really mean to be a Conservative?  What does it really mean to be a Liberal?  Following the 2000 presidential election crisis I began to ponder the meaning of the two words that dominate American politics.  I looked around for a book on the topic, but most books about these words were written from one point of view to attack the other side.  They simply weren’t much help.


     So-called Conservatives were proud to be Conservatives and most so-called Liberals did not embrace the word.  But many Conservatives didn’t seem conservative as I understood the word...and why was Liberalism endangered?


     I began reading and looking into the political history and the idea for a documentary on the topic started forming in the back of my mind.  In 2004 I took the plunge with a sabbatical from my day job at C-SPAN.  Having watched politics up close behind a C-SPAN camera for over a decade I thought a basic investigation of the history of these two words might help political junkies better understand the problems we face.


     Over the course of three months I interviewed about a dozen people who I thought could best tell the history of Liberalism and Conservatism.  I also attended one gathering of Liberals and one gathering of Conservatives to talk to the rank and file activists.


     Since that time my wife Simone and I have been editing, researching, gathering archival film clips and photographs, creating electoral maps and animations, composing music, shooting sequences with a little blue donkey and a little red elephant; and also trying to be good parents, neighbors, employees, and spouses.  It hasn’t been easy but four years later we have completed a 90 minute documentary.


You’ll have to watch it to decide if we succeeded but in the end our goals are very simple:


1) Use these two words to tell the story of American politics in the past 120 years so that the audience can step outside the red and blue box we have created and see ourselves in a fresh light.


2) If you are fed up with the status quo, maybe these old words are part of the problem...let’s find new ways to talk about politics.


     We think that everyone can learn something from these 90 minutes, and we believe that the timing is perfect for Liberalism and Conservatism 101: a time when we need to face the future in fresh new ways without the destructive baggage of the past haunting our language.




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Director Richard Hall interviewing Noam Chomsky in his MIT office.




Director Richard Hall interviewing Howard Zinn in his Boston University office.




The donkey




The elephant




Richard Hall, producer/director and Simone Fary, producer





American Feud




American Feud DVD