Air Staff
Hosts
Lowman S. Henry
Chairman & CEO, Lincoln Institute
Lowman began his career as a broadcast and print journalist, served as Political Director of the Republican State Committee of Pennsylvania, President of the Pennsylvania Leadership Council, Chief of Staff to State Senator Earl Baker, and as Executive Assistant to the Attorney General of Pennsylvania. He has served in elective office as a Dauphin County Commissioner and a Lower Paxton Township Supervisor. He was the Republican Party’s nominee for Pennsylvania State Treasurer in 1992.
Lowman serves on the board of directors of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers' Association (PMA), the Keystone Council of the Boy Scouts of America, the Pennsylvania Association of Non-Profit Organizations (PANO), and on the advisory board of the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy in Pittsburgh. Mr. Henry is a member of the Charlton United Methodist Church and of the Colonial Park Rotary Club. He is a graduate of Gannon University in Erie, Pennsylvania. He is married to Carol Lynn Henry and they have three sons.
Ryan M. Shafik
Director of Communications, Lincoln Institute
A graduate of Villanova University, Ryan has worked extensively in politics since his days as a college student. He first became involved in George H.W. Bush's 1992 Presidential campaign. In 2000, Ryan served as an intern for U.S. Senator Rick Santorum while also working as a campaign staffer on a Congressional race. In 2002, Ryan went on to manage the campaign of Pennsylvania State Senator Stewart Greenleaf.
Ryan helped pioneer the online grassroots effort for Congressman Pat Toomey's 2004 U.S. Senate Campaign. Following the Toomey campaign, he teamed up with Chris Lilik and started the Young Conservatives of Pennsylvania (YCOP). It is there in the capacity of Executive Director that Ryan and Chris put the Young Conservatives of Pennsylvania on the political map.
In addition to working on many political campaigns, Ryan was a candidate for the Maryland House of Delegates in 2006. He also has experience in the business world where he previously worked as a financial advisor for Legg Mason Wood Walker in Baltimore.
Commentators
Pat Toomey
Pat Toomey, age 45, is the President, CEO and a Director of the Club for Growth, America’s leading limited-government, free-enterprise political advocacy group.
Before joining the Club for Growth, Mr. Toomey served as a member of the United States House of Representatives, from Pennsylvania’s 15th congressional district, for three terms, from January 1999 through January 2005. Mr. Toomey distinguished himself as one of Congress’s leading advocates for limited government and personal freedom. He served on the Budget Committee, the Financial Services Committee and the Small Business Committee.
In 2005, Mr. Toomey co-founded Team Capital Bank, now operating in New Jersey and eastern Pennsylvania. He co-chairs the Board of Directors.
Prior to his service in Congress, Mr. Toomey co-founded, owned and operated four very successful, original-concept restaurants and bars in Allentown and Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
His first career was in investment banking from 1984 through 1991. He developed and managed a $21 billion derivatives trading operation for Morgan Grenfell Finance, Inc. in New York, supervising sales and trading operations in New York, London and Tokyo.
Mr. Toomey attended La Salle Academy in Providence, RI and graduated from Harvard University, cum laude, with a degree in government.
Dr. Paul Kengor
Dr. Paul Kengor is professor of political science at Grove City College, a four-year, private Christian liberal arts college located in Grove City, Pennsylvania. He is executive director of the Center for Vision & Values, a Grove City College think-tank/policy center. He is also a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace at Stanford University. He has been quoted or published in most major publications from across the ideological spectrum: New York Times, USA Today, Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Daily News, Washington Post, New York Post, National Review, Chronicle of Higher Education, San Francisco Chronicle, American Spectator, New York Newsday, Political Science Quarterly, Presidential Studies Quarterly, Washington Times, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Boston Herald, Roll Call, Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, Philadelphia Inquirer, Christianity Today, World magazine, National Catholic Reporter, National Catholic Register, Our Sunday Visitor, the Jewish Press, Jewish World Review, International Herald Tribune, Manchester Union Leader, and others.
His latest book is a major work on Ronald Reagan's role in undermining the Soviet Union, titled, The Crusader: Ronald Reagan & the Fall of Communism, released in October 2006 (HarperCollins), which includes never-before-published documents from KGB archives, Soviet media archives, and numerous once secret but now declassified NSC, White House, and Reagan administration documents. The book is being translated into Polish, and the paperback rights have been purchased by HarperPerennial. He is also the author of God and Ronald Reagan (ReganBooks, HarperCollins, 2004), which made bestseller lists for The New York Times (extended list), Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, and Christian Retailing, among others; the book reached #2 on Amazon's non-fiction list. He is most recently the author of God and George W. Bush (ReganBooks, HarperCollins, 2004), which reached #5 on Amazon's non-fiction list and made The New York Times' extended bestseller list. He is co-editor with Peter Schweizer of Assessing the Reagan Presidency (Rowman-Littlefield, 2005). He is currently under contract to write three additional books, including a biography of former Reagan confidant and national security adviser William P. "Bill" Clark, Reagan's so-called "right-hand man." He has also written chapters or essays in books published by Oxford University Press, Columbia University Press, Palgrave-Macmillan, Lexington, and others.
Kengor is a frequent contributor to MSNBC, C-SPAN, NPR, PCN-TV, and FoxNewsChannel. He has appeared on many TV shows, including "Hannity & Colmes," "The O'Reilly Factor," "Tony Snow Live," "Fox & Friends," the 700 Club, and "Scarborough Country." He has done hundreds of radio-talk shows, including the shows of Sean Hannity, Diane Rehm (NPR-WDC), Michael Reagan, Warren Olney (NPR-LA), Glenn Beck, Janet Parshall's America, Truths that Transform with D. James Kennedy, Dennis Praeger, Michael Medved, G. Gordon Liddy, Linda Chavez, Kresta in the Afternoon, Jim Quinn, Stand to Reason with Greg Koukl, and Laura Ingraham.
Kengor is a frequent public speaker. His venues have included the National Presbyterian Church, the Reagan Library, the U.S. Capitol Building, the Commonwealth (Pennsylvania) Prayer Breakfast, the Heritage Foundation, and the Gerald R. Ford Library, among many others. He has also spoken at many colleges, including the University of Virginia's Miller Center, the College of William & Mary, the Ave Maria College School of Law, (Ann Arbor, MI), Calvin College, Franciscan University, Regent University, Claremont McKenna College, Saint Vincent College, Patrick Henry College, the University of Pittsburgh, and more.
Kengor has done work for a number of think tanks, including the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Heritage Foundation, and has served on the editorial board of Presidential Studies Quarterly. He received his doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and his master's degree from American University's School of International Service. Kengor, a native of Western Pennsylvania, lives with his wife Susan in Grove City, PA, along with their children Paul, Mitch, Amanda, and Abigail.
Colin A. Hanna
President, Let Freedom Ring, Inc., a non-profit public policy organization committed to promoting Constitutional government, free enterprise and traditional values. Let Freedom Ring's current projects include TheirOwnWords.com, a Jihadist awareness website; The Green Power Project, promoting construction of new nuclear power plants co-located with ethanol production plants to achieve operational synergy and reduced dependence on foreign oil, WeNeedAFence.com advocating the construction of a state-of-the-art physical barrier along our southern border as part of an overall border security strategy, and the Pennsylvania Pastors Network, an association of Biblically-faithful pastors in the Keystone State who want to engage their congregations on matters of public policy and culture that are legitimately connected to the Christian faith, but without politicizing their pulpits or endangering their churches' tax status. Colin is a former County Commissioner in Chester County, PA (1995-2003). Prior to his election he was a CBS sales executive in New York and Philadelphia; after CBS he started and sold several small businesses, including an advertising agency, a computerized barter exchange, a marketing and management consulting firm, an executive search firm and a computer service firm. Veteran, U.S. Navy; guest, Hannity and Colmes, The Situation with Tucker Carlson, Dayside, Fox & Friends, Your World with Neil Cavuto, The Big Story with John Gibson; Special Report with Brit Hume and The Lou Dobbs Report. Graduate, University of Pennsylvania.
Personal: Father of two; married to Pricie; they live in West Chester, Pennsylvania.