When Roger Custer of Young America’s Foundation took to the stage and opened the 2006 Conservative Student Conference, the first thing he explained was why the gathering was necessary. “It’s a shame you have to be here,” he told the 300-odd students in attendance, but liberals’ campus stranglehold leaves YAF with no choice. The left, he continued, “has never been for open debate or discussion.” Instead, it shuts out conservative speakers and, when necessary, engages in name-calling and physical harassment. But confront liberals with arguments and ideas, Custer claimed, “and you’ll win every time.” The speech was, at root, a...