Results tagged “David Frum” from ElectionObsession

And while on Frum's pages, his prior post is titled 'Can this marriage be saved?' The 'marriage' to which he refers is the post-Reagan GOP coalition of religious Christianist idealogues and small-government economic conservatives, which has at the very least won the last two elections for the Republicans.

It's a good question, and it's a complicated marriage. The question I would ask in reply is, "Has this been a marriage of convenience or convergence?" That is to say, did this coalition form because there's significant overlap between Team Values and Team Taxcut? Or did the coalition form because each of these two sides, with little in common, used the other to achieve its goals?

I don't know the answer to that question. What I do know is that if Frum's "Reader A" and, say, Andrew Sullivan are any indication, Team Taxcut has started to treat this as an open marriage.

And that doesn't bode well for McCain. You can see evidence of this in the fact that the GOP "base" that was "electrified" by the choice of Sarah Palin for VP consisted largely of Team Values. Team Taxcut? Not so much.

The National Review's David Frum is one of the few righties taking a sober approach to the GOP's nomination of Sarah Palin for Vice President. He frets — and with good reason — over the notion of such a foreign policy ingenue having to step in as President.

Last night, Frum highlighted an e-mail from an independent that bodes poorly for the McCain-Palin ticket:

I started the cycle with the idea that if I could at all find a palatable Democrat, I’d vote for him. (Not her, because not a fan of Hillary). I also hoped that the Republicans would nominate McCain because he had an image that was distinct from the Republican party that I felt duty-bound to reject. … What I want to report to you, though, is the deep disappointment I’ve had in McCain. I had thought that this was going to be the happy year where either outcome was pretty good. I no longer feel that way. ... Not only was this choice [of Sarah Palin] irresponsible, I suspect it is also politically tone deaf. Obama’s campaign has been premised on an appeal to voters exactly like me – voters who want a politics that does not so obviously delight in wallowing in the mud. If there are a lot of Independents like me, Palin is a disaster. She’s just performed what it is that is driving us from the Republicans. She’s running against hope and the notion that we need civility in our political life. She’s running against the notion that we ought to hold our fellow Americans in respect whether they come from small towns or big towns.

We will see how this plays out. Pro-life though I am; appalled by the social liberalism of the Democrats as I am; I really, really, really don’t want to live in an America that is capable of preferring that kind of ugly divisiveness to a genuine engagement with the serious issues that confront us all. This is not the time for spitball. It is the time for serious leadership. ... I want to come home to the Republicans. Right now I expect that it’ll be a good long while before that’s possible.