Free Republic

The most arresting idea in Adam Winkler's impressively learned study of US gun law, Gunfight, is the suggestion that contemporary American gun culture was more or less invented by the Black Panthers. Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, the party founders, had studied law and discovered California allowed the carrying in public of loaded rifles and shotguns, provided that the guns were not pointed at anyone. They seized on this law to stage theatrical confrontations with an Oakland police force they deemed hostile and oppressive - and then, most dramatically, in May 1967, to walk armed into the chamber of the...

In 2008, Mark Krikorian published an important new book arguing against permissive immigration. The book's central idea: what has changed since Ellis Island days is not the immigrants; it's the society they are immigrating to. In 1913, a Sicilian who migrated to New York City to do manual labor would discover a society willing to pay a high wage for his effort. In 2013 … not so. Yesterday's New York Times reports on a new study confirming Krikorian's insight. People of Mexican descent in New York City are far more likely to be living in poor or near-poor households than...

By Mr. Curmudgeon:Not all Republicans are happy with Mitt Romney's choice to make Rep. Paul Ryan his running mate. David Frum, former speech writer for President George W. Bush, is beside himself."At every turn, the party has demanded, 'More ideology! I gotta have more ideology!'" laments Frum in a column appearing on CNN.com. "With the selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate, Romney has now acceded to that wish. The least ideological Republican candidate since 1968 has committed himself to the most ideological Republican program since 1964."Actually, it was the least ideological Republican candidate since 1968 - Sen. John...

How can someone who writes compelling nonfiction be so terrible at fiction? I’ve just read the first few chapters of David Frum’s new novel, “Patriots.” It is bloody awful. It also defeats the purpose that Frum claims he intended for it, which was to write a novel that tells deeper truths than journalism. In fact it retreads ground Frum the journalist has gone over many times before, most notably his increasingly shrill belief that conservatives are nuts. Frum is a former conservative who is now trending liberal and may in fact be headed for the netherworld of Andrew Sullivanville; he...

After tonight, Newt Gingrich has to be considered finished. You don't get to be the nominee if you don't win primaries, and if Gingrich can't win Alabama and Mississippi, it's hard to imagine any other state in the country where he can win. While Gingrich may remain some kind of factor, in almost every remaining state, this race devolves to a Romney-Santorum battle. That's great news for Santorum, who has been hoping and yearning for a two-man race. It's acceptable news for Romney, who knows that party donors and insiders dread a Santorum candidacy as likely to lead to a...

You see, these are the moments when we’ll miss Andrew the most. The Washington Post offers a longish obituary on Breitbart after his passing, but includes this rather laughable assertion about halfway through: Mr. Breitbart’s political adversaries are speaking kindly about a man they often vilified.“There’s no point in engaging in political debate today,” said Ari Rabin-Havt, executive vice president of Media Matters for America, a liberal media-criticism group that once branded Mr. Breitbart “an ideological liar.” “My sympathy is with his wife and children.”Arianna Huffington, founder of the liberal-leaning Huffington Post, said in a statement: “I was asked many...

Bravo for Ann Coulter. That's not a sentence you might expect to read in this space, and I'm sure my endorsement will please nobody less than Ann herself. That said: bravo.

Faux-Republican David Frum took a shot at Fox News viewers on Sunday when he told CNN's Howard Kurtz that "people who watch a lot of Fox come away knowing a lot less about important world events." Frum's interview aired during the bottom half of the 11 a.m. hour of Reliable Sources. Even Kurtz, who has worked for the liberal media for three decades, challenged Frum's hard-line criticism of the right-wing media. "You're tarring with an awfully broad brush there" he told Frum, who in a recent New York Magazine column accused the conservative media

It’s a very strange experience to have your friends think you’ve gone crazy. Some will tell you so. Others will indulgently humor you. Still others will avoid you. More than a few will demand that the authorities do something to get you off the streets. During one unpleasant moment after I was fired from the think tank where I’d worked for the previous seven years, I tried to reassure my wife with an old cliché: “The great thing about an experience like this is that you learn who your friends really are.” She answered, “I was happier when I didn’t...

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...

October 25, 2011 (Unmaskingchoice.ca) - Earlier this week, noted conservative commentator David Frum, a former speechwriter of President George W. Bush, published a column on CNN’s website musing on the question “What if abortion became a non-issue?” While Frum has, in former days, been an impressive advocate for socially conservative values, ever since the 2008 election he has advocated for a desertion of social conservatism in order to “win” more elections based on fiscal issues. Besides the inherently flawed logic behind this position—it is impossible to advocate for smaller government while simultaneously deserting the protection of the family unit that...

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...

David Frum makes the argument that the spending cuts promised in the 1990 "read my lips" tax hike budget deal indeed did come to fruition (contra to my argument yesterday). He argues that, since spending as a percent of the economy declined in the 1990s, the spending cuts must have materialized.This is eminently-wrong for several reasons: CBO data shows that the promise--$274 billion in baseline spending cuts--not only didn't happen, but that baseline spending actually increased by $22 billion. This is simply what the data show. Spending as a percent of the economy did decline in the 1990s, but not...

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...

So Obama could lose if -- and here's the big if -- Republicans do not blow the opportunity by presenting themselves as Medicare-annihilating racist maniacs... Tea Party conservatives complain that Republicans who advocate restraint, responsibility and moderation do so in order to be nice to Obama. That's utterly upside down. Restraint, responsibility and moderation are indispensable to the defeat of President Obama. It is Tea Party conservatism itself that is Obama's last, best hope for a second term.

Not every Republican lives in Greenwich and earns millions. For non-wealthy Republicans – as for non-wealthy Americans generally – the past half-decade has been a terrible time. Perhaps they have seen their house collapse in value. Perhaps they have lost their home altogether. Perhaps their retirement portfolio lost its value. Perhaps they have lost a job. Perhaps their child cannot start a job. Perhaps they have been hit by all of the above. Or maybe they got lucky. Maybe they escaped any particular disaster. Yet they still face a reduced future. To repay its debts, the nation will need to...

Bill Kristol posts that he now believes that Mitch Daniels, Mike Huckabee and Michelle Bachmann will indeed all declare. The National Journal simultaneously reports that a Newt Gingrich declaration is imminent. Haley Barbour is definitely out. Marco Rubio is definitely out. Mitt Romney is clearly in. Tim Pawlenty is clearly in. Trump incredibly also seems inbound. Chris Christie, Sarah Palin, and Paul Ryan remain wild cards. Here’s one way to analyze what happens next. I sort the Republican candidates into three piles: CANDIDATES WHO COULD WIN THE NOMINATION Christie Pawlenty Ryan Romney (Bachmann is too obviously crazy. Daniels will be...

Here's a part of his post at CNN, where he is apparently a regular contributor, which makes the point: "Ben Smith in Politico reports that the trip was booked through a Christian tour operator. But the real news is who did not book the trip: the Republican Jewish Coalition, the group that brought George W. Bush to Israel in 1998, Mitt Romney in 2007, Haley Barbour in 2011, and many other presidential hopefuls beside. "Very likely you have never heard of the Republican Jewish Coalition. But then again, you probably are not seeking the Republican presidential nomination. If you were...

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...

Christie is not more conservative than Daniels, and arguably even less so. Christie told the Newark Star-Ledger that while personally pro-life, he won’t use his office to “shove that down people’s throats.” He supports New Jersey’s restrictive gun laws. And like Daniels, he has decided it’s tough enough to face his public-sector unions that he does not need to start an unrelated fight over right-to-work with private-sector unions. Yet the most acid-tongued of all right-wing commentators, Ann Coulter, has championed a Christie candidacy, asserting that if he declines to run, “Romney will be our nominee and we’ll lose.”