Free Republic

I wish I could offer up a better retort to this pathetic sh**bag ( Ace does it better than I ever could) but all I have to offer is this — piss off and die. Via Daily Beat/David Frum: “Of the dead, speak nothing but what is good.” It’s an ancient rule and a wise one, but one that does not do justice to the life and career of Andrew Breitbart, dead today aged 43. It is impossible to speak nothing of a man who traced such a spectacular course through the contemporary media. But to speak only “good” of...

A new CNN poll finds that about half of Republicans sympathize with the tea party movement. The other half either remain aloof or (5%) even express hostility. That second group of Republicans has received remarkably little media attention this cycle. Yet their man -- Mitt Romney -- has held steady in first or second place for the past three years. Meanwhile tea party Republicans have bounced from Sarah Palin to Donald Trump to Michele Bachmann to Rick Perry to (now) Herman Cain, transfixing the media every time they lose faith in one messiah and search for another. Yet sooner or...

- “I will continue driving the discussion for freedom and free markets…” - From Sarah Palin’s statement announcing her decision not to run for president. Um, probably not. Sarah Palin’s political voice had dwindled well before she announced her decision not to run. Now it will sink altogether into inaudibility. She will be no kind of force in future national discussions. She will have no sway over party debates. She will retain some starpower for a little while longer. She may for another cycle or two be able to help certain candidates for certain political offices raise some money. Even...

In this debt-ceiling fight, I'm having horrible flashbacks to the Republican debacle over health care. Then as now, what could have been a negotiated deal turned into all-out political war. Then as now, Republicans rejected all concessions by the president as pathetically inadequate. Then as now, Republicans refused any concessions of their own, instead demanding that the president yield totally to their way of thinking. Then as now, Republicans convinced themselves that they had the clout to force the president to yield. With health care, Republicans calculated spectacularly wrong. They pursued an all or nothing strategy and got -- nothing....

I was a strong opponent of same-sex marriage. Fourteen years ago, Andrew Sullivan and I forcefully debated the issue at length online (at a time when online debate was a brand new thing). Yet I find myself strangely untroubled by New York state's vote to authorize same-sex marriage -- a vote that probably signals that most of "blue" states will follow within the next 10 years. I don't think I'm alone in my reaction either. Most conservatives have reacted with calm -- if not outright approval -- to New York's dramatic decision. Why? The short answer is that the case...

On the day Mitt Romney formally announced his bid for the GOP presidential nomination, former Alaska Governor took a shot at his Massachusetts health care plan by criticizing government mandates. RealClearPolitics reports: ‘[E]ven on a state level and a local level, mandates coming from a governing body, it’s tough for a lot of us to accept because we have great faith in the private sector and in our own families and in our businessmen and women in making decisions for ourselves,’ Palin said. ‘Not any level of government telling us what to do.’ And yet… even her home state of...

On CNN’s Reliable Sources, conservatives Jennifer Rubin and David Frum discussed the declining television ratings of Glenn Beck and the recent conservative attacks on him. Rubin said Beck was creating a bad image for the Republican party, whereas Frum, a longtime Beck critic, suggested audiences are just tired of hearing ludicrous conspiracy theories. Rubin, seemingly speaking on behalf of Beck’s “elite” conservative critics everywhere, said: “Sure he doesn’t need our approval and we’re not giving him our approval. But to the extent to which he wants to influence events, which is presumably why does it – other than the money...

Dearly as I esteem Ross Douthat, I thought his blogpost today on the press and Sarah Palin did not hit the nail on the head. Ross: "No politician, from Bush to Barack Obama to Nancy Pelosi, is hated so intensely by so many Americans [as Sarah Palin]. And this is what’s so problematic, to my mind, about much of the Palin coverage: The media often acts as though they’re covering her because her conservative fan base is so large (hence the endless talk about her 2012 prospects), when they’re really covering her because so many liberals are eager to hear...

Stanley Kurtz on David Frum’s new effort to police political speech: Last week, the distinguished liberal thinker and activist William Galston, along with an equally distinguished conservative counterpart, David Frum, announced in the Washington Post the forthcoming founding of a new organization called “No Labels.” The stated aim of No Labels is to combat the “hyper-polarization” of American political debate by “calling out” politicians, media personalities, and opinion leaders who “recklessly demonize” opponents. Unfortunately, their announcement gives us reason to fear that No Labels will only increase the level of political acrimony by attempting to constrain debate, thereby exacerbating the...

Tea Party, Shmea Party. Post-election surveys suggest that Mitt Romney still leads as the favored Republican presidential candidate for 2012. His lead looks especially big in New Hampshire: Almost 30 points. Does this big lead translate into a smooth ride to the nomination? That depends on whether Romney's campaign follows the path of George W. Bush's in 2000 — or Hillary Clinton's in 2008. Here's the happy scenario for Romney: Like Bush in 2000, Romney is the Republican heir apparent in 2012. Like Bush, Romney has the backing of the party's biggest donors. Like Bush, Romney has national campaign experience....

March 27, 2010 Republican Elite In Disarray After David Frum Is Sacked By Think-Tank America’s conservatives were in open disarray yesterday after the abrupt sacking of a leading Republican for daring to blame his party for “the most crushing legislative defeat since the 1960s”. David Frum, who coined the phrase “Axis of Evil” when he was a speechwriter for President Bush, was fired by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) after posting a column on his website that called healthcare reform a disaster for Republicans and blamed it squarely on their own refusal to compromise with the Obama Administration. The prominent...

President Obama seems full of double talk these days, all smoke and mirrors, as Angelina Jolie reportedly has described him. (I’m loathe to borrow words from a celebrity but it is a spot on assessment.) Listening to the president’s comments lately, one would think the Republicans were in the governing majority over the past year and it was their fault the president couldn’t push through his costly, government expansion agenda. This is of course despite the reality that last year, the Democrats had solid majorities in both the House and Senate. Now that Obama is not delivering on his promises...

David Frum responds to Jennifer Rubin's article in Commentary titled "Why Jews Hate Palin." First off, Frum is right that the poll that Rubin cites doesn't really prove her case because 37% approval from Jews is actually very good . . . Frum then goes on to assert: Palin excites intense support among a core group of conservative Republicans....She polls poorly...among independents. I'll give Frum credit for changing what he considers Palin's core group of support from "social conservatives" to the broader group of "conservative Republicans." After all, with some recent polling showing Palin to hold a robust 79% favorable...

Ernest Hemingway offered a memorable description of the experience of going broke: it occurs at first very slowly, then all at once. The Obama foreign policy remains as yet in the "very slowly" stage. But the ultimate destination to which it is trending has already come into sight. AFGHANISTAN. George W. Bush took a lot of criticism for cutting taxes at the beginning of the prior administration's wars. What are we to say about President Obama cutting military spending at the beginning of his? Senior military commanders are pressing for more troops. The civilian overseers of the Department of Defense...