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What We Do
The Savvy Citizen equips ordinary Americans with the historical context, civic knowledge, and legal understanding needed to get a handle on the origins of American government, the evolution of American culture, the hope that unites, and hurt that divides, American society.
As Christina Perri sings, we’re only human!
How We Do It
We give it our all to …
(1) explain America’s founding, nearly 250 year history, complex legal system, and the fundamental rights and responsibilities of American citizenship,
(2) explore various parts of American life and grapple with why it is the way it is, and
(3) engage in lively and wide-ranging conversations with the melting pot of everyday Americans from all walks of life and worldviews.
Why We Do It
Simply put, we love to learn and to teach others what we know.
During the 2020 election cycle, American discourse fell into the gutter and it hasn’t left. Advocacy through fearmongering and falsehoods displaced rational conversations based on factual analysis at an unprecedented speed. Personal relationships were being sacrificed on the altar of political correctness which, at the end of the day, was generally based on feelings and presumptions rooted in subjective truth claims grounded in, well, nothing.
It was - and still is - a disaster.
Information, as they say, is the antidote to anxiety — we’re here to reduce this suffocating anxiety by presenting information in an organized and understandable way.
Enter … The 5 Pillars of Savvy Citizenship …
Our content is organized around 5 content pillars, set forth below.
These 5 pillars are designed to help you, the reader, watcher, listener, participant, gain and maintain …
(1) a working knowledge of the U.S. Constitution and the government it creates …
(2) a general understanding of the American legal system, the role it plays in society and culture, and how to participate in it …
(3) a strong familiarity with the fundamental, and non-fundamental, rights and responsibilities of American citizenship …
(4) a curiosity for differing viewpoints and a steadfast belief in freedom for all, and …
(5) an appreciation of American history and its place in the world.
As they say, school’s never out for the pro, so if you’re game to learn, then you, my friend, have come to the right place.
Who Is Doing It
Fancy Names: Kelley Keller, J.D. and Dr. Christian B. Keller
Actual Names: Kelley and Chris
Kelley
I’m Kelley, creator of The Savvy Citizen, primary author of this Substack, and host of The Savvy Citizen Podcast. I’ve been in the legal field since 1996 and if I’ve learned anything at all, it’s that American law and legal culture is way too complicated for ordinary Americans, meaning those who haven’t had formal legal training.
But law is the language of power, and those who do not speak it are vulnerable to being left behind. I started The Savvy Citizen as a way to start making sense of this epidemic of legal disfluency and how it has impacted American society. This led me to a general curiosity for understanding why modern America is the way it is and then sharing my findings with my friends.
Chris
My husband, Chris, is a professional military historian, focusing on the American Civil War and 19th Century U.S. history writ large. He’s written numerous books, articles, and essays on ethnicity in the war, specifically German immigrants who fought for the Union Army, and more recently on Confederate strategy and the command relationship between Generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, and why they lost the war on the battlefield.
Chris is my co-pilot on The Savvy Citizen, providing insightful historical context needed to truly understand the heart, soul, and psyche of America. Chris and I are a great team in life, and we hope to be a great team in this endeavor as well.
You can learn more about me at KelleyKeller.com and Chris at christianbkeller.com.
We appreciate your interest in learning more about this grand experiment we call America.
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To find out more about the company that provides the tech for this newsletter, visit Substack.com.
