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"You describe yourself as a calm conservative. But you have certainly aroused those to your right in the Republican Party. You know, talk show hosts like Mark Levin have come after you saying you're kneecapping your own. What about that?"To which Frum replied:
"Look, a lot of the conservative movement in this country is conducting itself in a way that is tremendously destructive. Both of the basic constitutional compact of the requirements of good faith and of their own good sense. I mean, when you were going on the air and calling the President of the United States a Nazi as Rush Limbaugh has repeatedly done. When Mark Levin -- you mentioned him - he said the President of the United States is literally at war with the American people. And then people begin, unsurprisingly, showing up at rallies with guns. It's just outrageous. It is dangerous. It's dangerous for the whole constitutional system."Really, David. Was that necessary? Talk radio is "dangerous for the whole constitutional system"? Like you're the second coming of James Madison?
And while we're at it: How come Bill Moyers and Jim Lehrer never ask Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin to come on their shows? Am I the only person who gets tired of seeing these third-person references to famous people who, I suppose, would be available for interviews when they are slanderously accused of fomenting assassination attempts?
Frum is neither "calm" nor particularly "conservative".
ReplyDeleteIf he was the former, he wouldn't take Moyer's bait so readily; if he was the latter, he wouldn't play "useful idiot" to Moyer's conservative bashing.
Frum is hardly irreplaceable and his "contribution" to conservatism won't be missed.
I always found Frum's blog at NRO to be pretentious, dull and pointless. It seemed especially dull when compared to some of the very funny (and original and well-written) posts on the Corner, Media Blog, etc. For "mere bloggers," the writers on NRO are very good at what they do. (As a sometime blogger I am amazed at how good the content is on NRO.) Frum would do book reviews of Thomas Hardy or discuss some weighty tome he'd perused. I just never understood why NRO gave him server space. When he finally left (sometime after he had attacked Limbaugh in a news weekly), I realized that he is a wishful thinker, not a deep thinker. He so wants to be considered a thoughtful member of the conservative crowd, but he just can't hold a candle to some he probably disdains for their lack of poise or pedigree. Sadly for him, he's just not all that influential. That's probably why he got a chance to chat with Moyers, no one else with sense and smarts would.
ReplyDeleteI think the first question anyone who interviews David Frumm should ask is "David in what way are you actually conservative?"
ReplyDeleteI mean seriously David Frum identifying himself as a conservative is like Barack Obama claiming to be a moderate.
One gets the feeling that Messrs. Frum, Brooks, Lowry, et. al., do, in fact, think they are the second coming of Madison.
ReplyDeleteDavid Frum describes himself as a 'calm conservative'...mmm...sort of like Perry Como was a calm singer, I guess. Here in a nutshell is what's wrong with these SquishyCons: what conservatives need is a Frank Sinatra, an Elvis, and not a Como. We need brass, not syrupy strings; Nelson Riddle, not Gordon Jenkins.
I must say, I'm getting sick and tired of this very obvious disdain being shown by the Squishes towards their brethren. I am not advocating the purging of the Kathleen Parker types: rather, they should just be ignored. If we were to do as they say and soften and/or compromise our beliefs just for the sake of getting elected, then what would we be left with? We would be left with Spectors, Collinses, and John/Meaghan McCains. We would not be worthy of label 'conservative' if we so compromised our values and beliefs that we committed a soft betrayel of them.
I believe that the future successes and triumphs of the Right lie in a coalition of conservatives and liberatraians and those modern breeds: the conservative libertarians and the libertarian conservatives. The four agree generally on what we're against and, in general, we agree as to what we are for.
Quoted from and linked to at:
http://www.thecampofthesaints.com/2009.08.16_arch.html#1250537382653
These guys should have figured out long ago that you don't get invited on NPR or MSNBC or CNN to defend conservatism or conservatives but only to bash them. Once they cross that bridge, they've lost all credibility.
ReplyDelete"I mean seriously David Frum identifying himself as a conservative is like Barack Obama claiming to be a moderate."
ReplyDeleteAmen!
In fact, everyone on the (actual) right should restrain from calling him ANY type of conservative. Instead, he should be labeled the progressive he is!
It's one thing to have some philosophical differences on the right, and another to have NO philosophical similarities, but call yourself conservative any way!
By calling himself conservative, Frum just proves he's a liar.
"You describe yourself as a calm conservative."
ReplyDeleteSomeone explain to Moyers that "stoned" is not to be conflated with "calm."
And you wonder why I have made it my goal to get this Frum fellow off the conservative reservation! I know you find David Brooks to be repulsive, but at least Mr. Brooks does not have a website dedicated to fellow panty-waists claiming to be "conservatives". Mr. Frum wishes his book-what was it again?-could be in the same statosphere as Mark Levin's "Liberty and Tyranny". Also, I would LOVE to see Mr. Frum fill in as a guest host on Mr. Levin's radio show for a week. Hell, he could not last one hour!
ReplyDeleteHow come Bill Moyers and Jim Lehrer never ask Rush Limbaugh or Mark Levin to come on their shows?
ReplyDeleteIn the words of the great Yang, "Never engage in a fair fight."
If you had to pay for that house in Washington and throw cocktail parties, and keep the old hag of a wife happy, wouldn't YOU sell out your principles?
ReplyDeleteWe'll I know RSM would'nt- I read that 9K word letter a couple of days ago - but lesser men would; and that's Frum and the rest of the boutique conservatives.
It's the lure of the cocktail circuit in DC/NYC/LA, IMO. These people get a few invites as tokens, and want to get more, so they pretend their hosts and the other guests aren't all pretentious idiots.
ReplyDeleteMake believe your new leftist moron friend has a point often enough and, before you know it, you're believing he does. The sincerity of it sells, too - and once you start bashing conservatives in your columns, you're in, baby!
But if you engage them head-on and make them look like fools in public, and trash their misconceptions and misbegotten idols in your writing, you won't be getting the call for the "A-list" events anymore.
It's not just conservative journalists who are susceptible to this phenomenon, either - it also explains how such a high percentage of conservatives elected to Congress turn into obsequious "consensus-seekers*" so fast.
* In Washingtonese, of course, a "consensus-seeker" is a conservative who is justifying selling out his principles.
Both major parties are at war with the American people. Both parties are fascist (by definition), and every bill the Craven Criminals on Capitol Hill pass without reading, let alone understanding, amounts to legislative malpractice.
ReplyDeleteEvery piece of anti-liberty, anti-Main Street, anti-Middle Class, unconstitutional legislation our ruling class comes up with is as convoluted as the physicist-created MBS that brought our economy to its knees, and will probably end about as well.
Stacy, congrats on the namecheck on Levin's show yesterday, and I hope the link he posted was fruitful. I knew you when!
Dr. McCain, brother Frum leads me to ask this question: Can men have BNS?
ReplyDeleteDavid Frum is high on my personal list of people whose funeral I look forward to.
ReplyDeleteHe is nothing more than another useful idiot to the leftists, who blatantly use him as a tool to bash real conservatives, and David is too stupid to realize that they are laughing at him, even as they use him.