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David Frum is wrong about the Right's past and future
By: Michael Taube, OpEd Contributor
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March 9, 2009
It’s awful when people attempt to revise history. But it’s even worse when an intelligent, capable individual like David Frum does it.
As some may know, the conservative commentator left National Review in January to start his own group blog, NewMajority.com. Frum felt “conservatism as we have known it - and the Republican party as an institution - are in very great trouble,” and “Conservatives and Republicans need a new kind of conversation about how we can adapt to new realities.”
Fair enough. The Republicans were wiped out last November, and have lost their sense of purpose and direction. Any vehicle that helps revive intellectual discourse among conservatives, and enhances debate for new and creative public policy measures, should always be encouraged. [Full disclosure: I’ve known Frum for years. We briefly discussed a one-off piece for NewMajority.com, but were unable to agree on a topic.]
Unfortunately, some troubling things are occurring on Frum’s group blog. His feisty critique of radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh has infuriated some conservatives. The early public policy debates are slowly evolving into political propaganda. And the Frumian model for conservatism is starting to become exactly what many on the right didn’t have in mind.
But the coup de grace happened Feb. 27, when Frum examined what he calls the “Goldwater Myth.” Briefly, this refers to Barry Goldwater’s groundbreaking campaign (and defeat) in the 1964 presidential election, and whether it ultimately paved the way for Ronald Reagan’s 1980 watershed victory.
Frum’s argument is twofold. First, “the Goldwater myth shuts down all attempts to reform and renew our conservative message for modern times.” Looking for the next Goldwater or Reagan could lead to a “disastrously unelectable” GOP presidential candidate in 2012. For conservatives, this would mean four more years of President Barack Obama.
This has some merit. The most desirable GOP presidential candidates should have some Goldwater and Reaganesque values, but future GOP leaders need to forge their own identities. As I wrote in The Examiner in March 2006, “There’s a simple explanation why we haven’t found the next Reagan – there isn’t one, and there won’t be another like him.”
Second, Frum doesn’t completely accept the Goldwater-Reagan link. As he noted, “It was not Goldwater who made Reagan possible. It was [Jimmy] Carter. Had Carter governed more successfully, the Goldwater disaster would have been just a disaster, with no silver lining. And there was nothing about the Goldwater disaster that made the Carter failure more necessary, more inevitable.”
I’m afraid the man who wrote “Dead Right” is dead wrong. While Goldwater and Reagan were different people who faced very different political circumstances, the latter succeeded due to the path that the former set in motion. In other words, Goldwater did make Reagan possible.
Many others agree. Peggy Noonan, Reagan’s former speechwriter, once called her boss a “Goldwater-type conservative.” Stephen Hayward, author of “The Age of Reagan,” noted that even “when Reagan attacked the same targets as Goldwater, he did so with a light and humorous touch.” Lee Edwards of the Heritage Foundation wrote that “building on Goldwater's ‘Why Not Victory?’ philosophy, Reagan as president pursued a multi-track national security strategy.”
There’s also NR founder William F. Buckley’s famous phrase: “The point of the present occasion is to win recruits whose attention we might never have attracted but for Barry Goldwater…at the well-planted seeds of hope, which will flower on a great November day in the future, if there is a future.” As columnist George F. Will later added, “There was a future. It arrived 16 years later.”
Frum must face facts. Many of Goldwater’s supporters were Reagan’s supporters. Goldwater’s positions about democracy and freedom evolved into Reagan’s agenda. Goldwater’s electoral strategy of making inroads in the South was accomplished by Reagan. And Goldwater’s task of selling conservatism was successfully completed by Reagan.
Did Carter’s inept presidency help Reagan? Of course. But it’s difficult for Frum to assuredly say a successful Carter administration would have changed the course of history.
The Gipper was a brilliant communicator, appealed to many demographics, and brought young people out to vote by the boatload. Even if Carter had deftly handled the Iranian hostage crisis, I still think he would’ve had his hands full with Reagan.
Frum’s right that the GOP must rebuild, but it shouldn’t rewrite the past in favor of an uncertain and directionless political future. A new majority can be built by combining the historical Goldwater-Reagan link with a modern fiscal and social conservative approach to politics which has broad-based voter appeal. It’s been done before, and it can be done again.
Michael Taube is a former speechwriter for Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He can be reached at miketaube@yahoo.com.
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