What Frum’s Firing Tells Us About Politics Today

[Jefferson23]

** Take note of Frum's opinion of Fox News, quite telling.

March 26, 2:03 PM, 2010

By Scott Horton

I’ve previously suggested that, in terms of tactics, I see the G.O.P. diverging into two main tendencies. One is Karl Rove’s G.O.P., in which short-term partisan gain trumps all other considerations, electoral politics tops policy, and pumping up the base is the instinctive reaction in every contest. Rove’s approach has created the present G.O.P.: an enraged group of largely white, over-40 males with its heaviest concentration in the states of the old Confederacy and in the Mormon Belt of the Mountain West. The alternative is David Frum’s G.O.P., which operates from a clearly defined set of conservative principles, believes in a longer-term strategy focused on building the party back to something approaching a plurality, and is committed to finding a modus vivendi with Democrats that allows the G.O.P. to accomplish at least some of its objectives when it’s out of power. Frum has presented a very compelling case for his views, and were he to prevail, it would produce a G.O.P. that pursues most of the same objectives as before, but behaves differently as it pursues them.

But yesterday, Frum was fired from his $100,000-a-year consultancy at the American Enterprise Institute. That decision tells us a good deal about AEI and the current dynamics within the Republican camp. In today’s AEI, policy experts aren’t there to do analysis and give advice—they’re there to serve as made-to-order propagandists. Differing views are not wanted. This is reinforced by Bruce Bartlett’s report in a post entitled, appropriately, “The Closing of the Conservative Mind”:

Since is no longer affiliated with AEI, I feel free to say publicly something he told me in private a few months ago. He asked if I had noticed any comments by AEI “scholars” on the subject of health care reform. I said no and he said that was because they had been ordered not to speak to the media because they agreed with too much of what Obama was trying to do.

Bartlett reminds us that he was himself fired from a conservative think-tank after publishing a book that criticized the Bush Administration’s lack of budgetary discipline. Paul Krugman notes that Bartlett must be right about this. He flags a 2003 Heritage Foundation health-care report that endorses a position suspiciously similar to the bill that Obama just signed into law. And Heritage is generally reckoned still further to the right than AEI. Conor Friedersdorf, on the other hand, checks the record and finds plenty of evidence of AEI health experts, in fact, weighing in on the matter. (UPDATE: Bruce Bartlett has now posted an “apology and clarification” in which he acknowledges having gone too far. He adds this: “With the benefit of hindsight I should have left the charge of muzzling out of my original post because it distracted people from the larger point I was making about the rigidity of thought at conservative think tanks and adherence to the Republican Party line, which I still believe to be the case. The fact that David was fired and the way he was fired is sufficient proof of that.”)


remainder here: http://www.harpers.org/archive/2010/03/hbc-90006783

[bigtree]

1. It proves the 'republican line' is just convenient bullshit

. . . used to further whatever obstruction or corporate influence or protection they're peddling at the time. They almost never mean what they say. Their entire platform is based on positions even they can't reasonably believe.

[Jefferson23]

3. As they continue to implode I will add, watching McCain publicly

dismissing Palin's target and reload graph to garner credibility for his even further right Republican Senate challenger, is
astonishing to watch.

There is a former Republican congressman, Mickey Edwards, who has been writing critically of his party for years, the GOP considers
him a turn coat. Now Frum has been tossed aside too, and the denial that Republicans are not giving acceptance to the most radical/racist
anti-government voices, is absurd. I believe the Republicans fear a third party candidate from the tea baggers and instead of going to the middle and reclaim Independents, which they lost due to the Palin choice, they embrace racist and anti-government lunatics.

[midnight]

2. Critical thinking and discussion is a must for anyone serious about excellence.

[godai]

4. 'Karl Rove's GOP'... exactly

Rovian politics are alive well in the RW of the GOP.

[ThomWV]

5. This is the most important story that no one will pay attention to of this year.

Frum's firing is the most significant thing the "Republican Party" has done since Bush lost the election and it tells more about the Parties' future than anything their mouthpieces are out blabbering from one day to the next.

[Jefferson23]

6. Absolutely, watching them try to regain control by lending legitimacy to the tea party nutters is

quite evident. Moderate Republicans and Independents are once again left out of their circle.

[ThomWV]

9. What scares me is that is shows the beast has no head

Don't get me wrong, I am no fan of Frum, but he has one thing that was respectable about him, he honestly assesses situations and could be led to an intellectually honest debate. He would not go there willingly and he would use every form of subterfuge at his disposal to sway your opinion to his given his own devices; but the one thing that he was consistent about as far as I could see was that when honestly asked he honestly answered. He did not dodge questions and gave candid and generally well informed answers.

As evidence of this I'd simply point to the reason he was fired. If it is taboo within the Republican Party today to look at a dog and say 'on that end is the head on on the other end is the tail' while pointing out which is which then that Party is toast. A man would be wise to see where the traditional base of the Republican party lands out of this, because the knuckle draggers have taken over what was their Party with nothing in sight to make one think its going to get better. They can't stay - where they gonna go?

[Jefferson23]

10. I agree with you about Frum, and as I mentioned earlier there

have been voices, and credible ones, even more so than Frum imo, that have warned the Republicans, but they are flatly rejected.

Since Palin was the main reason why moderate Republicans and Independents rejected McCain, you would think they would heed
the warnings. Doesn't look like they are willing to do that any time soon.

[Douglas Carpenter]

7. knr

[Jefferson23]

8. Thanks for the kick and recommend. n/t

[Jefferson23]

11. A Message From Mrs. Frum

* I read this linked through exiledonline.


March 26th, 2010 at 12:38 pm by Danielle Crittenden | 83 Comments |Share


As the old saying goes, if you want a friend in Washington, get a dog. Perhaps that’s why the Frum household now has three.

I’ve been married to David Frum for nearly 22 years–or just under half my lifetime–and have lived through numerous controversies that have resulted from his speaking out for the ideas he believes in, regardless of the personal consequences to himself. Right after we met, when he was a budding journalist in Toronto, I watched him challenge Canada’s then-ruling Liberal establishment on the issue of Free Trade. It was a huge and hysterical issue back then–as big as healthcare is here today–but at that time the hysteria was entirely on the left. Nerdy girl that I was (and am), my head was quite turned by this young man who quite literally waded into throngs of hostile crowds and patiently debated with them as to why the North American Free Trade Act would be good for Canada. And at the end of these debates, even those who remained unpersuaded (and of course there were many), expressed grudging respect for David’s willingness to engage them in a discussion, and not a shoutfest.

So fast forward to this week, when conservative hell erupted over David’s now infamous “Waterloo” column on the GOP healthcare defeat. For days I’ve been sitting here in the bunker with him (and our three dogs), watching the whizzbangs land all around. What is distressing is not the predictable hate mail he has been receiving–and thanks to the internet, he’s been receiving in hundredfold; we’ve both seen that before. What is distressing (to me, anyway) are the dishonest slurs on his character and integrity by people who know him, and in some cases have known him for many years–truly ugly suggestions that David is motivated by cynicism or sycophancy, or both. (If he were, maybe he’d still be em

We have both been part of the conservative movement for, as mentioned, the better part of half of our lives. And I can categorically state I’ve never seen such a hostile environment towards free thought and debate–the hallmarks of Reaganism, the politics with which we grew up–prevail in our movement as it does today. The thuggish demagoguery of the Limbaughs and Becks is a trait we once derided in the old socialist Left. Well boys, take a look in the mirror. It is us now.

David of course doesn’t need my defense–and a defense coming from his wife probably isn’t worth much (although I can categorically state this has been posted without his authorization, approval or even, um, knowledge–he’s flying somewhere over the country right now). My role right now is to pass him the flask in the trench.

But to return to Washington and dogs: Along with the bile, there has been an equally considerable outpouring of support and defense, from friends and foes alike, who–whether they agree with David or not–are horrified by the guillotine that is being set up in the public square of democratic debate. They understand that nothing good can come of this, for anyone of any political stripe.

For this support, we are both very grateful. And while I wouldn’t have thought it possible to admire David more than I do, I have to say he is still turning this old girl’s head–now more than ever. (end)

http://www.frumforum.com/a-message-from-mrs-frum