Frum the Heart: Bush a Shining Beacon of Moral Rectitude

January 7, 2002. Republican minion, Bush speechwriter, author, and occasional National Public Radio commentator David Frum spoke in an interview today about his latest book, The Right Man, which details his view of the current Bush administration and its inner workings. Among other topics, he discussed partial origins of now-infamous Bush-isms—for example, describing Iran, Iraq, and North Korea as an “axis of evil”—and praised Bush for his honesty, integrity, and moral rectitude.

“I just love the President’s hypocritical moral high ground,” Frum bubbled. “In his reality, the rich are always right—if you have the power and money to do what you want, then by definition it must be morally acceptable; if not, you’d better not step out of line. That’s a good message to send to America’s disadvantaged and others who have no power over their own situations, like pregnant teens—clearly, if they don’t have power, it’s because they don’t deserve it. It’s just so wonderful how the President can cover up a lifetime of shady business dealings and then self-righteously condemn all the Enrons and Worldcoms of the world. We will never know the half of the dirty tricks he and Cheney pulled while they were running amuck in corporate America. Too bad, because it would make fascinating reading—a real how-to guide for up-and-coming Republicans. Yep, there’s the difference between Republicans and Democrats: they’re all equally greedy and corrupt, only the Republicans are smart enough not to get caught. And the Republicans are masters at convincing everybody that everything they do is above reproach. They don’t apologize for anything, and they just keep on truckin’. It’s a great strategy. Why be defensive when you can be offensive?”

Frum continued, “I’m also a great admirer of Bush’s political double dealings. Look at his stand on terrorism: Palestine may be considered a terrorist nation, but Israel is not. And look at his stand on who’s got or getting which nuclear weapons and whether we should start a war with them. North Korea is far larger, more militarized, more of a threat to its neighbors and America—because it sells its weapons and wares to any and all comers, not excluding al Qaeda or Iraq—and is far closer to having not one but two nuclear weapons than Iraq. But Bush would never dream of starting a first-strike war on North Korea. Instead, the President has convinced the nation and the world that the right thing to do is to attack the smaller, weaker nation, thus starting a war that only he seems to want. It’s marvelous—a real public relations coup.

“A lot of Americans are under the misapprehension that George W. Bush is stupid but good-natured. Well, I’ve seen enough to know that he is definitely not good-natured, and I think that’s a flaw people can find endearing. It is my job as a Republican to whitewash the President as much as possible and to brainwash the ordinary citizen into forgetting about his crappy state education record in Texas or his personal battle with alcohol or any of that other stuff that would make people cringe if it dawned on them, ‘My God, this man is running the country.’ It is my job as ex-Bush-speechwriter to take the fall for making Bush look like an idiot, even though final approval of what he will say in any given speech is completely up to him. It is my job to convince the American people to get uninvolved with government and to place their complete trust in the President and let him do all the thinking for them.” Frum beamed, “It was a tough job, but I’ve done it well and I’m proud of that.”

Israel either Totally Unreasonable or Delighted with Palestinian Leadership

January 7, 2002, Tel-Aviv, Israel. In response to a double suicide bombing recently perpetrated by Palestinian militants, the Israeli government is taking the two-pronged approach of firing on refugee camps and embargoing Palestinian leaders from traveling abroad to London, England to attend talks hosted by Prime Minister Tony Blair. Since Mr. Blair’s talks were proposed solely to discuss feasibility of reengineering the uppermost levels of Palestinian self-rule, the world community must conclude either that Israel is being completely unreasonable or that Israel is perfectly satisfied with the current Palestinian leadership. Given the increasing volume and frequency of complaints the Israeli government has made in recent months against Arafat’s regime, the latter seems unlikely. “The Israeli government continues to act like a bratty bully throwing a tantrum. What a bunch of big fat spoiled babies!” U.N. negotiator Ima Milquetoast said. “They want everything their own way and are not willing to negotiate at all. They wouldn’t concede a moldy bean to the Palestinians at this point. They don’t seem to realize that Palestine was there before outside Zionist influences established Israel at Palestine’s expense. I hope they don’t expect Arafat to turn over the region to them wholesale, or we’ll all be here a very long time. Someone needs to introduce them to Dale Carnegie or something.”