AZ Republic: The Goldwater Institute - 20 years later

Great story in the Republic yesterday featuring the Goldwater Institute. Darcy Olsen, President and CEO, Tom Patterson, Chairman of the Board, and Clint Bolick, Director of the Center for Constitutional Litigation, were interviewed. Some excerpts -

Once known mostly for its brain, the conservative think thank lately is showing some brawn, with its year-old litigation center keeping governments in check. We are the first free-market policy organization in the nation to establish a litigation center.

We are, to toot our horn a little bit, by far the most-quoted think tank locally and draw the most interest on our Web site (www.goldwaterinstitute.org) by about a factor of 2 over all the others.

We're privately supported. We've been growing by 15 to 20 percent a year for the past seven years and hope to continue on that positive trajectory.

We have suits not just against the city of Phoenix, but right now (against) Mesa, Tempe, the Arizona Corporation Commission, gone after some regulations by the Arizona Department of Education, so it's a broad effort to rein in government whenever and wherever it oversteps it constitutional boundaries.

Nationally, the conservative movement has really lost steam, direction and unity. Nothing could be further from the truth here in Arizona, where to the extent that we are just chock full of ideas. I believe it is our side that is defining the agenda, to a large extent. We've got initiatives on the ballot that are absolute cutting edge and, I think, can serve as models to the nation. Many of things going on here at Goldwater are emulated across the country.