Who would have thought that David Frum, of all people, would be the grown-up at the day care?
Can we conservatives please stop kidding ourselves about Barack Obama's "qualifications"? Yes, if I had been a Democratic donor back in 2006, I'd sure worry about whether Barack Obama had what it took to be president. That was before he took on the toughest political operation in America, before he beat Bill and Hillary Clinton, before he won 18 million primary votes.
Obama's nomination was not handed to him. He fought hard for it and won against the odds. "Qualifications" predict achievement. Once you have achieved, it doesn't matter what your qualifications are. Who cares whether the guy who built a big company from nothing didn't have much of a resume when he started? But if you are applying to run a big company built by somebody else, the resume matters ...
The worst mistake in any fight is to under-estimate your opponent's abilities. Look what happened to the people who under-estimated Reagan. If conservatives are to have any hope in the coming weeks, we should wake up to the fact that we face in Barack Obama a formidable man, who appeals to something important and deep in the American electorate. He's not a superman, he has vulnerabilities, he can be beaten. But he won't be beaten until we who are trying to beat him understand why and how he has come so far ...
Quite so. Obama has spent the last 18 months being savaged relentlessly by the GOP dirty tricks sleaze machine (not to mention the Clinton one), and he's survived that and proved what he's made of. Palin has, thus far, proved sweet fuck all. And this makes them somehow equivalent in terms of experience? Only if you're a complete cementhead.
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On the Current today they had Stephen Taylor and later David Frum and Kathryn Jean Lopez. I'd say Frum is the twelve-year-old at the daycare; Taylor is one of the new kids packing for his first day there.
Part 3:
http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/2008/200809/20080901.html
The Current just finished in Calgary, so will be on in Vancouver shortly.
Sorry for the double post: what really bothers me about that segment is the suggestion that the Republicans are happy to have Hurricane Gustav approaching, because they get a chance to pretend they care this time.
But he won't be beaten until we who are trying to beat him understand why and how he has come so far ...
By *we*, does Frum mean his colleagues at Teh Corner, including, most of all, Kathryn-Jean "The future Mrs. Mitt Romney" Lopez?
Ha, ha, ha! Cry some more, Frummie. Then come to back to Canada. We've got a whole regimen of socialised mental health care mapped out just for you.
we face in Barack Obama a formidable man, who appeals to something important and deep in the American electorate.
If this is the case, why is it so important to Frum that he be beaten?
Oh yeah. It's because Frum is an idiot. Just remembered.
I agree. In this excerpt, Frum sounded like a pretty rational guy, right up until the last sentence or so. Then, in spite of him knowing his own candidate and despite acknowledging Obama's qualities, he just bowled on ahead saying how the Republicans should try harder to beat Obama. I realize he gets his bread-and-butter from the right wing, but at a certain point if your team has enough broken legs, you might want to put a little money on the other team instead.
Not quite sure what makes Frum tick. I used to think that his extreme right-wing posturing was some youthful rebellion against his famous mother's somewhat centrist views, but surely he's outgrown that?
But then again, maybe not.
Not quite sure what makes Frum tick.
Who knows? I just read that post (of which the only sensible part was excerpted here) in its entirety, and frankly, I can't help but conclude that these neoconsevatives are quite literally insane, the brightest ones most of all.
Not quite sure what makes Frum tick.
He has claimed it's due to "socialists" who mocked him as a teen for reading Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago. Yup.
To me, he's always come across as a member of the elite working in the interests of the elite. Daddy's very rich (as in millions of dollars of art donations to the Art Gallery of Ontario). Son inhabits a world of privilege (wealth, famous parents, Yale and Harvard education, editorial position at the Wall Street Journal, stint at the White House, etc.) and obviously has never developed his mother's ability to empathize with anyone who's not like him.
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