Hired Guns?

Self-styled conservative purist, David Frum, wonders whether Limbaugh, Beck et al might not simply be mercenaries who would gladly sell out to “progressivism” for the right price. Kathy Shaidle asks a first-rate question: “What’s Frum’s excuse?”

David obviously sees himself as “frummer” than thou, which makes him uniquely qualified, in his own mind, to serve as head of the conservative movement’s internal affairs department. While millions of people – conservative, moderate or just plain alarmed – watch with mounting fear and anger as capital “P” progressives under the leadership of the Obama administration attempt to dismantle this country’s traditions of individual freedom, self-reliance and limited government, Frum asks that we hold the noise down and observe the proprieties - and while we’re at it, to be considerably less obstreperous in our opposition to adopting European-style socialism. Perhaps, as one of Frum’s brethren, David Brooks, suggests, we should all just resolve to Be British, and embrace conservatism’s proposed role as a mere sheet anchor, to be used in case of emergencies to stabilize the Ship of State on its unchangeable course toward the socialist utopia.

Sorry, old boy, but being an ex-scribbler for National Review hardly qualifies you as a conservative strategist. No more than it does, say, Gary Wills or David Brooks or Jeffrey Hart. And even your mentor, William F. Buckley, Jr., conceded that it is frequently the conservative’s duty to stand athwart history shouting, “Stop!” In our headlong rush toward the nanny state, urging that we slow from a gallop to a canter is an admission of defeat, and you will never rally the troops to the banner of the white feather.


“My dear fellow, how very un-Burkean of you.”