Overview for Frum Now

Freddie Mac Didn't Pay $300K for History Lectures

In the obsequies over the Perry candidacy, let's not overlook this audacious moment from the debate: Newt Gingrich's breathtaking assertion that Freddie Mac paid him $300,000 for a lecture he gave "as a historian" about how they should forthwith cease their business practices. Turns out, that's …

Written by David Frum on Thursday November 10, 2011

Winning the Next Ohio

In my column for The Week I explain why voters rejected John Kasich's anti-collective bargaining bill and what can be done to allow bills like that to succeed in the future: Republicans have been looking to cuts in future retiree benefits as a way to avoid future tax increases. In the …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday November 9, 2011

Wal-Mart Wants to be Your Doctor

Or so NPR reports . The nation's largest retailer is planning to offer medical services ranging from the management of diabetes to HIV infections, NPR and Kaiser Health News have learned. This raises a question I've long wondered about: Why has there never appeared a giant low-cost …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday November 9, 2011

The Knives Come Out for Cain

Politico has a big headline this morning: "GOP urges Herman Cain to address allegations." But when you ask "who precisely in the GOP is doing this urging?" you get a more modest list: Oran Smith, who heads the Christian conservative Palmetto Family Council in South Carolina, Chuck Hurley, …

Written by David Frum on Tuesday November 8, 2011

Signs of the Times

Bill Kristol had a cryptic editorial in the Weekly Standard this weekend, wistfully remarking that 2012 is not 1980 and that conservatives may have to resign themselves to "a not particularly distinguished four-year governor who’d zigged and zagged back and forth to be acceptable to large parts …

Written by David Frum on Monday November 7, 2011

SCOTUS Could Force Obama's Hand on Jerusalem

In my column for the National Post, I discuss how a Supreme Court case might force the White House to explain its policy towards Jerusalem: Two can play at this game. Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority have abandoned negotiations with Israel. They are seeking UN recognition of …

Written by David Frum on Saturday November 5, 2011

Libertarians For Oligarchy?

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Written by David Frum on Friday November 4, 2011

Huntsman Makes His Jobs Pitch

Here's Jon Huntsman's new jobs-focused ad :

Written by David Frum on Friday November 4, 2011

A Conservative Free Thinker

Robert Patterson makes a welcomed point in the Washington Examiner : For decades, conservative economists have essentially argued that carving out loopholes for property income at the expense of workers will generate more jobs and greater prosperity. Yet the legacy of the Reagan, Clinton, …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday November 2, 2011

The Coming Herman Cain Culture War

It's only a matter of time before the Herman Cain sexual harassment settlement is unsealed. The exact nature of the charges against Cain will be revealed. They will most likely turn out to be very ambiguous: banter, innuendo, etc. At that point, here's what will happen: People on the …

Written by David Frum on Tuesday November 1, 2011

An Idea for Republicans, Ctd

Last Friday I talked about the importance of the poverty problem to a limited-government party in a modern society. It comes down to this: poor people are expensive. The money they don't earn in wages they still cost society in terms of prison cells and emergency room visits. In the 1990s, …

Written by David Frum on Tuesday November 1, 2011

Overlooked Clue in Cain's Sex Harassment Story

Here's the most neglected detail in the Politico story on Herman Cain and the sex harassment charges: Both women received separation packages that were in the five-figure range. In the context of late 1990s sex harassment litigation, that is a small settlement. (Here's a sampling …

Written by David Frum on Monday October 31, 2011

Malcolm Wallop RIP

In the inimitable style of the British obituary, the Daily Telegraph remembers Malcolm Wallop, who represented Wyoming in the US Senate from 1977 through 1995: [Wallop] was born on February 27 1933 in New York City, son of Oliver Wallop, the younger son of the 8th Earl of Portsmouth – …

Written by David Frum on Sunday October 30, 2011

My Sun News Network Interview

While I was in Toronto on October 27th, I had a chance to interview with Michael Coren of Sun News Network. We discussed what I think is wrong with the economic proposals from many Republicans, but also why President Obama has not been doing his job very well. amateur porn You can watch …

Written by David Frum on Friday October 28, 2011

An Idea For Republicans

In the 1990s, many Republicans took the problem of hard-core poverty seriously. (One of those poverty-conscious Republicans was Sen. Rick Santorum, now the one presidential candidate who takes seriously the data on faltering upward mobility in America.) In 1999 and 2000, candidate George W. …

Written by David Frum on Friday October 28, 2011

Meet Jeff Cimbalo

Frum Forum is honored to welcome a new regular contributor, Jeff Cimbalo , who will write about the gathering crisis in the European Union - a crisis of democracy as well as of debt and currency. It's difficult to do justice to Jeff's polymathic genius. A lawyer and litigator based in …

Written by David Frum on Thursday October 27, 2011

Who Burned the GOP Brand?

Aaron Blake and Chris Cillizza describe a new CBS/NYT poll : The poll also asked which class voters thought the Obama Administration and Republicans in Congress favored. While people were pretty evenly split on whether the administration favors the middle class, the rich or the poor, …

Written by David Frum on Thursday October 27, 2011

Greece: The End of the Beginning

A deal on the Greek debt may or may not be helpful, but it certainly is clarifying. Now we can begin to understand: the Euro crisis is not about Greece, and it's not even really about European government overspending. It's about the negative consequences of building a monetary union without a …

Written by David Frum on Thursday October 27, 2011

Perry's Plan: Politics not Policy

In my column for The Week I explain that Rick Perry's tax plan is designed to appeal to voters in the Republican primary, not to policy wonks who care about whether or not the plan makes economic sense: The wonks point out that (as conventionally scored) Perry's tax plan would blow a giant …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday October 26, 2011

Bumbling Joe

"When he rises to speak, he does not know what he will say. As he speaks, he does not know what he is saying. When he sits down again, he does not know what he has said." That old House of Commons joke about a certain kind of garrulous parliamentarian applies to America's own Joe Biden. CNN …

Written by David Frum on Tuesday October 25, 2011