Frum's Flimflam

Reading through David Frum's Unpatriotic Conservatives, a shabby indictment against those he lazily blankets as "paleoconservatives," I was reminded of a fascinating paper Jörg Guido Hülsmann of the Mises Institute delivered some years back entitled The Production of Signs and the Growth of the State.

"The most important class of signs are the words we use, in particular the words of the written language," explained Hülsmann. We come to understand "the fundamental facts of moral and political life: religion, liberty, love, hope, faith, property, justice, and all other purely intellectual things" through the configurations we create with letters of the alphabet.

How fragile then are those cherished concepts, and all the more so in the hands of a manipulator such as David Frum. Frum's style of debate is Kafkaesque.

Note how Frum dictates the terms of debate. He starts off by generously welcoming "questions" about the war on Iraq. But with the next breath Frum constricts the scope of discussion, making the acceptance of the "war on terror" a prerequisite.

By the by, the National Review's blog really showcases the essence of the "girlie-boys," to use Ann Coulter's coinage for this lot. Recall, the "boys with the bowties" dropped Coulter's syndicated column after September 11 when the firebrand columnist suggested, tongue-in-cheek, that we should invade Muslim countries, kill their leaders, and convert them to Christianity. Considering that the neoconservatives at the NR advocate the two of Ann's moves, I've a strong suspicion as to what prompted the firing caprice.

Or more appropriately, Coulter's contention that converting Muslims to a religion of peace might do the trick. This was beyond the pale for the multicultists at the NR (who also regularly chide the Pope).

It's hard not to notice how similar the simpering on the NR's blogistan is to Mrs. Frum's infamous e-mail. Danielle Crittenden had done a mass mailing to her pals after her hubby had coined the axis of evil phrase, expressing her "hope you'll indulge my wifely pride."

Rod Dreher of NR exudes the same fake saccharine humility: "I suppose it might be unseemly to praise one's own magazine," he blogs, "but I am proud to be associated with a publication responsible for David Frum's magnificent essay." As Golda Meir once said, "Don't be humble. You're not that great."

In response to Jonah's whine that "paleos have been goading and mocking" him, not least by naming his mag the "Goldberg's Review," I suggest substituting the "Goldberg Variations."

Bach's monumental score for the keyboard ought to remind Jonah that the West that paleolibertarians and conservatives love and wish to peacefully restore is the civilization epitomized by the faith-inspired beauty of Bach. It's the West reflected in the poignancy and "deep pain" Pope John Paul II expresses these days with every fiber of his crippled frame. The picture of this righteous man, head clasped in hands, overcome with sorrow at the savagery unfolding, trumps the nasty specter of the American metropole at its most shameful, cheered by the "girlie-boys" at NR.

A testament to his manipulation of language is that the "facts" Frum marshals for each of the raps he draws up against paleos don't coincide with the accusations:

Frum's mode of argument is slightly more sophisticated than Michael Savage’s. Savage yelled that he'd demonstrate to his viewers "Why We Fight." If language means anything, then the reason we fight against Iraq must directly relate to an aggression Iraq has visited on us, at the very least.

Instead, Savage began screening and rescreening the attack on the Twin Towers, amidst hysterical yelps of, "This is Why We Fight." His frenzy incites the same in the recipient of the distorted message, thus subverting reason. Note how the signs Guido Hülsmann speaks of have been severed from what they signify – the message Savage conveys is that we fight Iraq because Saddam brought down the Twin Towers. On the facts, this is false.

The sophistry of the State's speechwriter is similar: As evidence that Pat Buchanan "espouses defeatism," Frum dredges Buchanan's observation that other than to use their might, Americans do not understand the conflicts and terrain they plunge into. This is an intelligent observation about American insularity and cultural chauvinism.

Frum affects a similar disconnect between the indictment and the evidence he advances against Toronto Sun foreign correspondent Eric Margolis. Margolis recommended non-aggressive ways in which Arabs might prevent war against Iraq. This Frum labels as a "yearning for defeat." If one respects the words used by the communicator – Margolis – and their meaning, rather than resort to conjecture, then what Margolis was saying was aimed at trying to peacefully thwart American aggression and prevent defeat for all involved.

As is evident from his tittle-tattle tome (and like his wife), Frum is a gossip. His essay is in keeping with this unfortunate character trait. He produces a series of vignettes designed to "prove" that paleos developed an ideology (which, in the case of paleolibertarians, is as old as the natural law), in order to compensate for alleged career failure.

So we discover that the delightful Paul Gottfried doesn't entertain his students and that paleos are among the more "fractious and quarrelsome folk in the conservative universe." (Frum fails to allow that non-conformists do tend to be "belligerent," the word my spouse uses for his wife.) To discredit paleoconservative or paleolibertarian ideas, however, one must tackle the ideas, not the personalities. Claiming that Paul Gottfried, a consistently engaging and interesting intellectual, didn't win a popularity contest with a bunch of 19-year-olds fails to tackle his ideas. Nor can he be refuted by the fact that he teaches at a small college. In order to be taken seriously, Frum must deal with the substance, not personalities or professional travails vis-à-vis the mainstream.

I can't speak for paleoconservatives, but paleolibertarians care first about the effects of the state on civil society. In the words of Lew Rockwell:

Everything flows from the passion for "the Old Republic of property rights, freedom of association, and radical political decentralization." What Frum calls our "obsessive denunciations of Martin Luther King," is borne of the understanding that "civil rights" legislation is inimical to property rights and freedom of association.

Perforce, Frum charges paleos with racism. And he mocks us for allegedly being incapable of reconciling our alleged belief in "the incorrigible inferiority of darker-skinned people," with our perception that "darker-skinned people are gaining advantage over whites."

While the strength of the paleolibertarian team comes from its enduring commitment to natural rights and justice, the strength of the Frum faction comes from its endorsement of the Almighty State. Yet, the State is conspicuously absent from Frum's silly screed.

Frum must certainly be aware that the State redistributes wealth from those who create it to those who consume it. Frum must also be aware that libertarians oppose this coercive distribution of wealth by the State. And even Frum must be cognizant of discernible trends in wealth creation and wealth consumption. Ditto where crime is concerned: Certain populations are more likely to be perpetrators, others more likely to be victims.

Are these observations racist? To the extent that it is a relevant variable in crime and welfare, paleos comment honestly about demographics.

Yes, certain segments of society are gaining at the expense of others, but there is nothing inexplicable here if one considers the entity whose bidding Frum does so effectively. The ousting of white males from positions of prominence is courtesy of State directive! Surely even David Frum knows that. The beef paleolibertarians have is with the State for seizing and redistributing private property, for prohibiting the rightful exercise of freedom of contract and freedom of association, and for making all-out self-defense impossible.

Jonah claims, incidentally, that David Frum is "libertarian on the economy." I don't know any libertarian who supports the pseudo-science of climate change and the concomitant advocated policies, which Frum apparently does. But if he has a libertarian streak, Frum must have heard of property rights. Why, then, is it a racist notion that productive Americans should not have to subsidize free riders? Frum heaps scorn on Buchanan for having said that "many Americans in the first country are getting weary of subsidizing and explaining away the deepening failure of the second."

Just as property rights are not a new paleo idea, but rather a little Lockean indulgence taken very seriously by the American founders, so too are paleo ideas on foreign policy and American adventurism, rooted in, to quote Felix Morley, the traditional American attitude of "opposition to what George Washington called ‘overgrown military establishments.’" Frum's attempt to cast paleo ideas as new and discontinuous is ignorant of the history of the ideas.

Equally revealing about the Frum framework is his aversion to objective truth. He says that "race and ethnicity are huge and unavoidable issues in modern life, and the liberal orthodoxies on the matter tend to be doctrinaire and hypocritical." Paleo refutation, however, he condemns because it too advances orthodoxies. Does it not occur to this doxy of the State that some "orthodoxies" may be true? Is it not possible that what Buchanan and Harvard economist George Borjas report about immigration is simply correct?

As I've written, and with reference to Borjas' work, it is true that since the 1965 immigration amendments, "the United States has been granting entry visas to persons who have relatives in the United States, with no regard to their skills or economic potential." "Immigrants today are less skilled than their predecessors, more likely to require public assistance, and far more likely to have children who remain in poor, segregated communities." An influx of the unskilled is, moreover, responsible for the lowering of wages across the board, something that hurts poor Americans, especially blacks.

Since 1965, mass immigration has constituted the quintessential "swamping by the central state of an existing population for political ends," to quote paleolibertarian economist, Murray N. Rothbard. Those who laud the changing US, and want more of the same, ignore the fact that this radical transformation, good or bad, has been engineered by the State, to which Frum is in thrall.

Again, the State's speechwriter pries words from their meaning. This time Chronicles' Thomas Fleming catches static for asserting that we "would soon be a nation no longer stratified by class, but by race as well. Europeans and Orientals will compete, as groups, for the top positions, while the other groups will nurse their resentments on the weekly welfare checks they receive from the other half."

Why, pray, is this statement evidence of "racial animus"? Orientals and Europeans, if I am not mistaken, are the highest earners. They shoulder the tax burden. I would think that as a "libertarian on economics," Frum would be irate that, for being high achievers, certain people are denied equal treatment under the law.

Once again, Frum's appended slur doesn't jibe with the utterance of the slurred.

Frum's impoverished coda is full of journalistic jingoism about the epoch September 11 has unleashed. Paleos, spoilsports that they are, have failed to celebrate one of the most formidable consolidations of State power in recent American history. For this failure, David and the "girlie-boys" are going to turn their backboneless backs on us.

To Frum's "War is a great clarifier," we offer Ludwig von Mises' words: "War only destroys; it cannot create. War, carnage, destruction and devastation we have in common with the predatory beast of the jungle." A good synonym for neoconservative.

Yes. I don't think my ranching neighbors should have 30mm chain guns or grenade machines on their trucks. ...or nuclear weapons

But, IMO, there's something wrong with people who want to own weapons of mass destruction if they're not members of our military

Nuclear weapons are different in that they will harm the person you're aiming at in one fell swoop. And your statement that weapons of mass destruction now include apparently anything you don't feel safe around? I thought it was (at least according to the government at this point and time) just nuclear and chemical weapons. Don't let the government know, they'll have another limitation on the 2nd Amendment right out

I'm a Republican, not an anarchist. IMO, anarchists and their associates are out to help the Saddamocrats win elections.

Well I'm a conservative, not a Republican. And I'm for saving and returning to the limitations found in the Constitution for the government of this Republic, not making you feel safe, warm, and cozy. BTW, nice fell swoop name calling there. Anyone who doesn't agree with you is now an anarchist or a Saddamocrat

"Weapons of mass destruction that kill people other than your target are not protected by the second amendment."

Some constituencies pretend to see "arms" as being all inclusive for the purpose of scaring more voters into supporting "gun control," and others are mad enough to actually worship Ayn Rand and company (anarchists, many of whom are leftists in disguise).

"Do you support the current Assault Weapons Ban?"

Of course not. Semi-automatic rifles are no threat to civilian peace (although fatherlessness is). They're good hunting, marksmanship and rural home defense tools. But leftie thinks semi-autos are a threat, and a few leftie insurgents pretending to be conservatives can best defeat our 2nd Amendment rights by promoting the legalized home use of any and all weapons (e.g., chain guns, nukes) by omission of limits, to scare a lot of voters into supporting more "gun control" (although all of us who have been in combat specialties for our US military see "guns" being something different from small rifles and pistols, banning of yet another, more personal kind of "gun" being a scarier matter altogether).

I believe your evaluation is way off the mark. In fact I'd call it a convenient copeout. I don't see the level of guilt by association that you and others seem to see in David Frum's piece.

The guilt-by-association technique is plainly evident in the opening paragraphs of the article. Since you seem to be unable find his use of it, here you go.

CASE 1: "You may know the names of these antiwar conservatives. Some are famous: Patrick Buchanan and Robert Novak. Others are not: Llewellyn Rockwell, Samuel Francis, Thomas Fleming, Scott McConnell, Justin Raimondo, Joe Sobran, Charley Reese, Jude Wanniski, Eric Margolis, and Taki Theodoracopulos."

Let's examine that statement. He opens by identifying the list as "these antiwar conservatives." That is a reference to what he described in detail two paragraphs earlier as persons characterized by the following terms:

"These conservatives are relatively few in number, but their ambitions are large. They aspire to reinvent conservative ideology: to junk the 50-year-old conservative commitment to defend American interests and values throughout the world — the commitment that inspired the founding of this magazine — in favor of a fearful policy of ignoring threats and appeasing enemies."

Next Frum posts his list of names of those who he considers to meet that description. This action by definition implies that the persons he names are associated in a group by shared characteristics.

CASE 2: Frum continues, "The writers I quote call themselves "paleoconservatives," implying that they are somehow the inheritors of an older, purer conservatism than that upheld by their impostor rivals."

By this action he is assigning an identity label to the people he associated together in the previous case by way of listing them. They are now, by his argument, no longer a list that allegedly shares common qualities, but now one that also shares a common label.

CASE 3: In ascribing qualities to the "paleos" Frum then states "Fed up as they were with the Second America, however, the paleos felt sure that they spoke for the First America with an integrity the traditional conservatives, let alone the neos, never had" and "For a good many of the paleoconservatives, that something was, for a spell, Serbian nationalism" and "OF all the limits against which the paleoconservatives chafed, the single most irksome was the limit placed by civilized opinion upon overtly racialist speech" and "Racial passions run strong among the paleos. And yet, having read many hundreds of thousands of their words in print and on the screen, I come away with a strong impression that while their anti-black and anti-Hispanic feelings are indeed intense, another antipathy is far more intellectually important to them." and "Having quickly decided that the War on Terror was a Jewish war, the paleos equally swiftly concluded that they wanted no part of it"

In short, he says that "paleos" are by definition nationalist racist anti-semites, a claim he attaches to that label primarily by quoting American Renaissance fringers. Thus the guilt-by-association argument is complete, implicating Novak and others as anti-semites.

In shorter form, his argument breaks down as follows:

1. Conservatives sharing a certain political position on the war include persons X and Y.
2. Persons X and Y are thus included in a group, which goes by the label A.
3. Person Z is also a member of group A and person Z is a racist anti-semite as proven by an array of quotes.
4. As shown by person Z, group A's characteristics include racist anti-semitism.
5. (Implicit) And since persons X and Y are part of group A, they too must be racist anti-semites.

The obvious flaws in Frum's argument appear at every stage, but first and foremost, the list of names to which Frum applies the "paleo" label is inaccurate. It contains some people who call themselves "paleos," some who simply call themselves "conservatives," and some who would never dream of calling themselves conservative at all as they are "libertarians." Thus, to associate them all together under the blanket label of "paleos" is an act of dishonesty. Only by categorizing all of those names as "paleos" can Frum paint them together with a single brush of anti-semitism based on the statements of another "paleo." Therefore it is necessary that he fabricate an association upon which to declare guilt.

The essay by Frum was set up in the first two paragraphs and has more to do with those opening words, then anything else.

I'd say it is set up in the first four paragraphs, because it is paragraph four where he makes the first association of names.

"Well I'm a conservative, not a Republican. And I'm for saving and returning to the limitations found in the Constitution for the government of this Republic, not making you feel safe, warm, and cozy."

That's a slippery ad hominem attack. But what is the most powerful weapon you would allow in the hands of citizens who aren't in the military? Would you legalize the ownership and carrying loaded 30mm chain guns on the vehicles of non-military citizens? ...just trying to pin down some position on your part here, but they keep slipping away.

You posted "Frum's Flimflam." Do you agree with that piece?

"BTW, nice fell swoop name calling there. Anyone who doesn't agree with you is now an anarchist or a Saddamocrat."

I won't bite on the recurrent straw man and accusation. But I will say that anyone who disagrees with war being waged for the defense of the USA is not a conservative. Anyone who wants to legalize any and all drugs with absolutely no regulation is not a conservative. Anyone who pushes the "separation of church and state" and "freedom from religion" hype (which is not in the Constitution) is not a conservative. Anyone who wants to legalize the ownership by drug dealers/pimps of fully automatic, large bore weapons is not a conservative. Anyone who would want to authorize a 50% (or was it 50 cent?) gas tax, as Perot said he intended to do, is not a conservative.

My positions are clear. What are your positions on these matters?

You're approaching the substance of this article all wrong.

>>>Since you seem to be unable find his use of it, here you go.

I never said anything even remotely like that. I did say, quote: "I don't see the level of guilt by association that you and others seem to see in David Frum's piece."

As I said, if you read the first two paragraphs, you'll understand the relevent aspects and the thrust of Frum's piece. You've decided to turn this into something it is not.

Frum's article is clearly about how certain conservative voices, continue to ignore the realities of terrorist threats that America faces in the world today. It is a desire on their part, to accept and appease the enemies of America, instead of condemning and challenging them. Novak and Buchanan have said it time and time again. >>> Iraq hasn't attacked the US, why are we invading Iraq? <<< I'm paraphrasing, of course. This is the thrust of the argument presented by the anti-war conservatives and goes to the core of their opposition.

These so-called conservatives have made it very clear, they want a more isolationist foreign policy then we have right now. I don't support the US being the policeman of the world, but things have changed since 9-11. It is the job of the CIC, President Bush, to make sure the US is protected and defended from all enemies, both foreign and domestic. Terrorism has no ethical foundation and no moral compass. Terrorism exists to destroy civilized society and slowly bring down the great democratic powers of the world. To allow terrorism to continue to exist, is unacceptable.

President Bush understands that terrorism will only be defeated if we stay on the offensive and keep the terrorists off guard. Some people, like Novak and Buchanan, call this idea of pre-emptive strikes, imperialism or colonialism. I say buckola!

I say, we hit the bastrads before they hit us, again.

" That may be so, but keep in mind that conservatives have also been very critical of Frum's piece and, IMHO, rightly so."

It is true that Frum's column contained generalizations, but the rebuttal against Frum's column, called "Frum's Flimflam" (above, by Mercer?) was openly anti-American and anti-defense in general. There was nothing conservative about it. As for Novak's piece, any location of a copy of it has not been presented here that I can see. As for Pat Buchanan, he's blamed the Jews for too many things (like the war against the Iraqi regime) and has stated in slippery language that our government is controlled by the Jews. That's not American conservative. Compared to Frum, Buchanan is far more detrimental to conservative efforts.

The "lesser of two evils" is always better than allowing Hitlery in any form to be re-elected by the insidious shunting of otherwise Republican votes to teeny weeny, powerless third parties that devise anarchistic policies in order to defeat conservatives by associating their stated insane policies with the policies of conservatives.

I generalize, too, in that oddball third parties and "independents" are not good for conservatism in politics. And any who work against our defense with propaganda while we are at war, hurt the war effort and are probably not conservatives. Regarding being against attacking Iraq, I was only against it before the war started, as I am more inclined toward allowing Old Europe to invite it's own defeat while we build an umbrella defense and huge military unprecedented anywhere (contrary to third parties's efforts to shut down the military in favor of having citizens armed with WMD/large bore machine guns). But now that the war is started, I'm in lock-step with the rest of my conservative kind and want Sodom's regime defeated. I believe all who speak against the effort now to be anti-American whether they realize it or not.

But I will say that anyone who disagrees with war being waged for the defense of the USA is not a conservative.

Please supply evidence of Iraqi soldiers, missiles, etc. that have the range of 5000 miles. As I've said before, I support the troops and after the shooting started I will not question the decisions made by the President or his advisors.

Anyone who wants to legalize any and all drugs with absolutely no regulation is not a conservative

Find somewhere I've said that. You won't find it. However I do not support a national war on drugs. Any laws that the separate and sovereign states see fit to pass in response to drugs (which should be done) is up to the states

Anyone who pushes the "separation of church and state" and "freedom from religion" hype (which is not in the Constitution) is not a conservative

Again, I don't think I've ever said that. Quite to the contrary I believe the separate and sovereign states should maintain the state, not national, churches that many Founders fully supported

Anyone who wants to legalize the ownership by drug dealers/pimps of fully automatic, large bore weapons is not a conservative

I can fully support the right of the citizens of the respective states to own whatever weapon they choose to own. If drug dealers are owning them I suggest you ratchet up your unConstitutional federal WOD to get rid of the drug or allow the states to take care of them as an issue covered under the Tenth Amendment. Either way, what law abiding peaceful citizens choose to arm themselves with for self defense is none of the national government's business

Anyone who would want to authorize a 50% (or was it 50 cent?) gas tax, as Perot said he intended to do, is not a conservative.

And where exactly are you getting these arguments? Where have I said anywhere I supported Perot or his ideas?!? Perhaps if the government limited itself to the powers as outlined in the Constitution 'conservatives' like yourself would find you'd have a whole lot more in your pocket and a lot less of intrusion into issues that are no business of the national government

Ah, I see, after rooting out a few comments by Novak from his work with CNN. He blames the Jews, too, and calls the war against the tyrannical Iraq regime "Sharon's War." He "...insinuated that suspicions about Saudi financing of terrorism had been manufactured by Israel."

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-may031203.asp

So Novak is a buddy of Buchanan and sees a Jewish conspiracy under every rock. He writes conspiracy stories against American intelligence gathering (links behind following URL). The other conspiracy story writers of the left like his work.

http://freemasonwatch.freepress-freespeech.com/newsroom.html

And I see that the people behind the following URL are "pleased" with Novak nonsense about Zimbabweans being more of a threat to the USA than the Sodom regime.

http://aryanrevolution.blogspot.com/

Novak issued propaganda to defame conservatives and cheer for Sodom's troops in the following.

"Iraqis eating into coalition 'cakewalk'"
http://www.suntimes.com/output/novak/cst-edt-novak271.html

The Iraqi Information Minister couldn't have said it better.

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