Frum’s interesting comments on Bush

David Frum, establishment neocon, is saying the same thing about President Bush that so many of us less establishment types have been saying: Bush is a liar and a deceiver, who keeps talking about enforcing the law, and doesn’t mean any of it. Worse, Bush’s real intention, according to Frum, is to achieve the exact opposite of what he claims to want:

Putting the Guard on the border is a symbolic act. If that action symbolized a genuine new commitment to enforce the law, then it would be a good and valuable thing to do. But I am afraid that in this case, the symbolism is manipulative and deceptive. …

Tonight … the administration will do something that cannot be respected. It will misrepresent its actual policies. It will say one thing and do another—a recurring vice of this administration’s policymaking, alas. It will promise enforcement in ways it knows will fail—and it will then use the expected failure to justify doing the exact opposite.

The president’s behavior is so bizarre that it leads Frum to come up with his own version of the “Bush is a Machiavellian genius” theory. Here it is: The reason Bush is so mightily offending his Republican and conservative base is that he wants the GOP to lose in November, because a Democratic Congress will pass the amnesty which the GOP Congress opposes. Further, a Democratic Congress will harass and even seek to impeach the president, which will have the effect of … rallying Bush’s base!

As a frequent critic of Frum, I’ve got to say in fairness, this is pretty good.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 15, 2006 11:55 AM | Send