While Paul Ryan has been well-known on the national political scene for quite some time, he is a relatively new face to the public at large. His introduction as the likely 2012 Republican Party vice-presidential nominee on Saturday put me in mind of the slogan utilized by John F. Kennedy during his first run for Congress in 1946: "The New Generation Offers a Leader." Now in 2012, my generation has offered a leader.

Ryan was born on January 29, 1970, and falls into the category popularly known as "Generation X." In other words, he was just a toddler when Joe Biden was first sworn in as a United States senator. When Ryan presumably debates Biden in autumn, Biden's adult-long attachment to the federal teat will not be the only contrast in play. Ryan the likeable wonk will have the gaffe-prone vice-president befuddled and bewildered at every turn. The viewing public will see the difference between a statesman and a fool.

Ryan stands in stark contrast to Barack Obama as well. Obama has enjoyed presenting himself (helped by the compliant media) as the young, hip voice of the new generation -- we are the ones we have been waiting for and the like. Yet there is nothing young or fresh about Obama's rhetoric or his policies. Because he has been marinating in the cesspool of Marxist progressivism his entire life, he may as well be a white-haired ponytail-wearing professor of foreign policy driving a beat-up Volvo festooned with every hackneyed bumper sticker imaginable. He is, one hopes, the dying gasp of a segment of a generation that unleashed irreparable chaos, turmoil, and destruction upon this country - even as their fellows from another segment of their generation were maimed and killed in southeast Asia. Now they are attempting it on the grandest scale they could devise. A leader of the new generation will attempt to help stop it.

It is with pride to know that the first fellow "Gen X-er" on a national ticket is a seriously intelligent conservative grounded in the fiscal realities that have placed our nation in peril. And it is with enthusiasm that we look forward to Ryan being a significant part of destroying the final surge of the 1960s radicals who must be expunged from public life.

If Ryan continues to demonstrate his substantive mastery of public policy, and his ability to articulate a cogent demonstration of the conservative principles of limited government, perhaps the new generation will begin an era during which our citizens and representatives ask not what our government must do for them, but recognize what it cannot do and must not do.

Matthew May welcomes comments at may.matthew.t@gmail.com