Frum on Waterloo: Required reading!

In the midst of my 14 hour marathon watching of the health care vote unfold, I saw David Frum interviewed on CNN or MSNBC, (I can’t remember which). He summarized a recent article he had written in which he scorched the right-wing crazies, Limbaugh/Beck, and the GOP leaders who have caved in to the same. This was refreshing, if not astounding considering that Frum is an avowed conservative who was a Ronald Reagan speech writer.

The article is here, and as far as I’m concerned it it required reading.

An excerpt from the article:

We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.

There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or – more exactly – with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?

I’m just hoping things are really as bad as Frum paints them.

~ Tom

** Correction: Frum was a speech writer for Bush 43, not Reagan.