A Stumbling, Bumbling, Frum-bling Endorsement of Romney -- As Frum Fries the Tea Party (Again)

Kevin Drum at Mother Jones is alarmed at the pretzel-twisting politics of David Frum as he endorses Mitt Romney for president. His title: “The GOP Will Destroy America If We Reelect Obama, So We Must Let the GOP Win.”

At The Daily Beast – where many of the nation’s most annoying ex-conservatives or never-were-conservatives are ensconced – Frum declared he would vote for Romney, and then added if he didn’t live in midnight-blue D.C., he’d “vote with gusto” against George Allen or Akin or Mourdock, because congressional Republicans are a “destructive and irrational force” that would deliberately push America into recession to hurt Obama and seek to impeach him if he won:  

The question over his [Romney’s] head is not a question about him at all. It's a question about his party - and that question is the same whether Romney wins or loses. The congressional Republicans have shown themselves a destructive and irrational force in American politics. But we won't reform the congressional GOP by re-electing President Obama. If anything, an Obama re-election will not only aggravate the extremism of the congressional GOP, but also empower them: an Obama re-election raises the odds in favor of big sixth-year sweep for the congressional GOP - and very possibly a seventh-year impeachment. A Romney election will at least discourage the congressional GOP from deliberately pushing the US into recession in 2013. Added bonus: a Romney presidency likely means that the congressional GOP will lose seats in 2014, as they deserve.

....President Obama gave the order that killed Osama bin Laden. He ended the war in Iraq on acceptable terms. He is enforcing tightening sanctions against Iran, inspiring hopes of a peaceful end to that country's nuclear program.

Meanwhile, his opponents in Congress have behaved about as badly and irresponsibly as any opposition group since the congressional Democrats of the mid-1970s forced the defeat of South Vietnam. And as for conservatives in the country - well, I've posted my thoughts elsewhere on that particular plunge into paranoia and extremism.

Frum complained that he was voting against Obama despite how “Mitt Romney's campaign has been one long appeasement of the most selfish and stupid elements of the Republican coalition, and the instinct for appeasement will not terminate with the counting of the votes next Tuesday.”

Does this sound to anyone like a Republican or a conservative talking? Can we get beyond any oily mugwump claiming Frum belongs on the Right? Frum is clearly a painfully self-conscious moderate who wants to President Romney to consolidate Obama’s leftist gains, and help spur an “anti-Tea Party” to save the country:

The American system of government is malfunctioning badly. One thing President Obama got exactly right, in my opinion, is his skepticism that the system can be fixed from within Washington. It cannot. The incentives here are too perverse. What we need to make government work better is a citizens' movement that demands better functioning government in a broader public interest - an anti-Tea Party, supported by public-spirited leaders rather than wealth-protecting oligarchs. What we need inside Washington is an administration that respects market forces, works to control healthcare spending, and keeps out of the way of the gathering recovery.

Which is why, if I lived outside the District of Columbia, I'd split my ticket. I'd vote Romney for president, and balance that with a vote for a moderate-to-conservative Democrat for House and Senate, if such Democrats are locally available. If I lived in Virginia, for example, I'd vote with gusto against George Allen - a perfect example of what we don't need any more of in Congress. I'd vote against an Akin or a Mourdock, and against any member of the House who urged Congress toward a voluntary default in the debt-ceiling fight of 2011.

Frum doesn’t want Obamacare repealed. He wants it sensibly enacted by Eisenhower Republicans, just as the Eisenhower Republicans implemented and expanded the New Deal en route to the moderate Republicans (Howard Baker/Bob Dole variety) who expanded Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security. Reagan is just a bad dream to them. Tea Party haters have nostalgia for the days when me-too Republicans were "moderate" tax collectors for socialists:

I don't want to see Obamacare repealed. I don't believe it will be, not even if the Republicans retake the Senate, which I don't expect either. Precisely since the universal healthcare law will remain in place, I want to see it implemented by people who see cost control as the first priority - who will grant maximum flexibility to the states - and who will recognize how dangerous it is to finance Obamacare with taxes only on the rich. A law of benefit to all should be paid for by all, for otherwise beneficiaries lose all concern for costs.

What this country’s media needs is a good anti-No Labels, anti-Morning Joe mentality that pretends to be conservative as if prances in front of the liberal elites hoping for praises.