Free Republic

Yesterday, 11 National Post contributors named their preferred Republican nominee in less than 250 words. Being more indecisive and longer-winded, I needed 24 extra hours and 500 more words. I’m looking for two chief things in a candidate for 2012: The temperament, judgment, deftness and largeness of spirit required in the presidential office; and The creativity and intellect to respond to the global economic crisis — a crisis threatening to actually get worse if (or when) the euro implodes. Those conditions obviously and categorically exclude the clownish Herman Cain, the daffy Ron Paul, the dim Rick Perry and the firebrand...

David Frum is a writer who, in 1997, engaged in a spirited online debate with homosexual writer Andrew Sullivan over the topic of homosexual "marriage." In over 5,500 words of text, Frum was articulate, cogent, and compelling in his opposition to radically redefining marriage, saying that "this request isn't just misplaced, but is actually logically impossible." Now, however, Frum has changed his mind. In a short CNN op-ed last week, he wrote that "the case against same-sex marriage has been tested against reality. The case has not passed its test." Tested? Only five out of the fifty states (soon to...

I’m not going to go on at length about David Frum. We all know who he is; we all know what he is and what he represents. He’s a “conservative” who gets his jollies and press gigs railing at actual conservatives, along the lines of Kathleen Parker and, during the 2008 campaign, Peggy Noonan. Parker has gone on to CNN infamy alongside Eliot Spitzer, while Noonan has tried to rehab herself by claiming that the Tea Party saved the GOP. She’s right about that, but only from a rearview mirror perspective. It’s easy to get stuff right after it’s already...

Soho Properties has paid some $5 million in cash to buy the Burlington Coat Factory building, a building that yields no income. They are paying rent to hold rights to the Con Ed building, which also yields no income. All of this in the midst of the worst commercial property slump in memory, in an area of New York with a very uncertain economic future. And these are not super-rich guys: Sharif el-Gamal lives in an Upper West Side apartment purchased in 2007 for $1 million. Click here to read what $1 million bought in Manhattan before the crash. You...

It's called "Left, Right and Center," which claims to be a "civilized yet provocative antidote to the screaming talking heads that dominate political debate." But there's not a whole lot of truth in advertising for KCRW Santa Monica's radio program, which is also podcasted on the Internet. The show normally features Robert Scheer, editor of the left-wing investigative Web site Truthdig.com and a former Los Angeles Times columnist, representing the left. Matt Miller, a former Clintonista and senior fellow at the left-wing Center for American Progress represents the so-called center. And former Washington Times editorial page editor and visiting senior...

Well, that didn't take long. After Democratic supermajorities rammed through their health care bill, Republicans were full of sound and fury about how this injustice will not stand. Even John McCain was on board, telling a television interviewer, "Outside the Beltway the American people are very angry and they don't like it and we are going to try to repeal this." But in the GOP, cooler heads always prevail. What these Republican heads want to cool down is the campaign to repeal the health care takeover. Reports the Associated Press: "Top Republicans are increasingly worried that GOP candidates this fall...

Former Bush speechwriter David Frum says it’s hard to exaggerate the magnitude of the GOP disaster. And he blames this “most crushing legislative defeat since the 1960s” on conservatives and Republicans: At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994. Only, the hardliners overlooked a few key facts: Obama was elected with...