RSS Feed MenuI have been a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute since 2003. At lunch today, AEI President Arthur Brooks and I came to a termination of that relationship.
Below is the text of my letter of resignation.
Dear Arthur,
This will memorialize our conversation at lunch today. Effective immediately, my position as a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute is terminated. I appreciate the consideration that delays my emptying of my office until after my return from travel next week. Premises will be vacated no later than April 9.
I have had many fruitful years at the American Enterprise Institute, and I do regret this abrupt and unexpected conclusion of our relationship.
Very truly yours,
David Frum
Follow David Frum on twitter: @davidfrum
Originally Posted on March 25th, 2:49pm.
greycoat // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:24 pm
Dear Mr. Frum,
Let me say you are not a genuine Conservative. An idiot and fool perhaps, but not a genuine Conservative.
A verse you may wish to consider: PR 17:28 Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent,
and discerning if he holds his tongue.
You might want to take that advice.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:25 pm
TerryF98 // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:18 pm
“Coward, why are you so ill informed. There is no Public option in the bill.”
…….Unfortunately along with not knowing a lot of stuff(I’ve got at least three major errors of indisputable fact already) Septic Coward has never heard of that rule of life that that say’s
“It’s better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and confirm that you are one”
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:26 pm
“Coward, why are you so ill informed. There is no Public option in the bill.”
So says the pro government run healthcare crowd. You support government run healthcare, you just don’t have the gonads, even on the internet, to admit it. You need some help with your insecurity and low self esteem issues.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:28 pm
greycoat // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:24 pm
“A verse you may wish to consider: PR 17:28 Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps silent,
and discerning if he holds his tongue.”
…..ho,ho,ho….how serendipitous….you should give the same advice to old Septic Ford who thinks as you do
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:28 pm
Frum can talks all he wants….no conservative is threatened by what he has to say. There’s always been liberals trying to hijack the Republican party…he’s nothing new. The funny thing is how consistently wrong he is about everything. He even had to characterize McDonnel in Virginia as some kind of liberal Republican when that guy was getting blasted by the liberal press from some very socially conservative thesis he wrote 30 years ago.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:30 pm
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:26 pm
“So says the pro government run healthcare crowd.”
……..for someone who doesn’t know the difference between the denial of coverage and the denial of a claim for reimbursement this is rich
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:31 pm
otto,
you’re consummately ignorable, like Frum. Whoever can make sense of what you just wrote please do, because to me it’s irrelevant. Parties exist to change public opinion, not conform to it. As you so wonderfully exemplify, most people need to be told what and how to think politically. And it should be the GOP’s charge to sway public opinion against nationalized healthcare.
otherwise, what we’ll end up with is a system like the public schools, which never function adequately. We observe this by their ever-presence in national political debates. except that public schools are relatively MORE decentralized than this bogus reform, so it’s guaranteed to be worse. Liberal = one size fits all. How caring of you.
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:32 pm
otto,
Do you ever post on any other website? You and sinz and Chek have been with Frum from day one. Does he pay you to post on here? Do you ever disagree with Frum on anything, and if you do, does he spank you?
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:35 pm
From National Review, this guy gives the real reason why AEI “fired” Frum….he didn’t do anything, which is what I suggested earlier:
On David Frum’s Departure from AEI [Charles Murray]
With Mike Allen’s account of his exchange with David Frum, we apparently have David’s version of his departure from AEI: Donor pressure forced AEI president Arthur Brooks to fire him. “But the elite isn’t leading anymore,” David is quoted as saying. “It’s trapped. Partly because of the desperate economic situation in the country, what were once the leading institutions of conservatism are constrained. I think Arthur took no pleasure in this. I think he was embarrassed. I think he would have avoided it if he possibly could, but he couldn’t.”
I have known and liked David and Danielle Frum for many years, and what I am about to write will end that friendship. I regret that. But his statement goes beyond self-serving. It is a calumny against an organization that has treated him not just fairly but generously.
Regarding donor pressure: The idea that AEI donors sit down to talk with AEI’s president about who should and shouldn’t be on the staff, or what the staff should write, is fantasy. David has never seen the slightest sign of anything like that at AEI. He can’t have. He made it up. AEI has a culture, the scholars are fiercely proud of that culture, and at its heart is total intellectual freedom. As for the reality of that intellectual freedom, I think it’s fair to say I know what I’m talking about. I’ve pushed it to the limit. Arthur Brooks is just as adamant about preserving that culture as Chris DeMuth was, and Chris’s devotion to it was seamless.
I do not have any certain information to convey about David’s departure, except what Arthur Brooks has already said publicly: David resigned. He could have stayed. But I will tell what is common knowledge around AEI: David got a handsome salary but, for the last few years, has been invisible as a member of the institute. Being a scholar at a think tank (or any institution) is not just a matter of acknowledging your affiliation in your books and op-eds. It’s also a matter of blogging at the institute’s blog, not just your own blog (David had a grand total of 3 posts on AEI’s blog in the year since it began), reviewing colleagues’ drafts, reacting to their ideas, contributing chapters to their books, organizing scholarly events, participating on the institute’s panels, attending the institute’s conferences, helping out with fundraising, serving on in-house committees, giving in-house seminars, and mentoring junior staff. Different scholars are engaged in these activities to different degrees. Full disclosure: I’m on the left-hand side of that bell curve (I make the trek from Burkittsville so seldom that I don’t even have an office at AEI). But David was at the left-hand tail. If I had to guess — and that’s what I’m doing, guessing — David’s departure arose from something as simple as this: Management thinks that an employee is not as productive a member of the organization as management thinks he should be. The employee disagrees. They part company.
I think that’s what happened. I also think that for David to have leveled the charge that Arthur Brooks caved in to donor pressure, knowing that the charge would be picked up and spread beyond recall, knowing that such a charge strikes at the core of the Institute’s integrity, and making such a sensational charge without a shred of evidence, is despicable.
TerryF98 // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:36 pm
Coward
“Frum can talks all he wants….no conservative is threatened by what he has to say.”
Then why are you here mouthing off about Frum?
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:40 pm
Because I have freedom of speech? See how that works? Frum runs his mouth about something, and I criticize him. He doesn’t get to live in a criticism-free zone as he seems to think. He wants Rush Limbaugh to be shut up, but now we are to see him as some kind of champion of freedom of speech because a private group decided he wasn’t worth the cushy salary he was getting and decided not to pay him anymore?
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:43 pm
The fact of the matter is, Frum didn’t do anything over at National Review either during his time there. They had him over in his own little blog where he talked about stuff of no interest to most Americans, stuff about Canada that few Americans could care less about…..he got paid to just blog whatever was it on on his mind, no matter how mundane or boring. There was no way Frum was driving any traffic to National Review, and nobody was buying their deadwood copy for the Frum columns on the back. The guy doesn’t sell. He’s not Mark Steyn, he’s not Thomas Sowell, he’s not Rush Limbaugh. He needs to get into another line of work in which he actually does work for the money he gets paid.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:49 pm
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:31 pm
otto,
“you’re consummately ignorable, like Frum. Whoever can make sense of what you just wrote please do, ”
……So why not ignore me
“Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:32 pm
otto,
Do you ever post on any other website?……does he spank you?”
……Actually I’ve had flu for a few days so I’m entertaining myself with puncturing the massive balloons of ignorance and misinformation that constitute the postings of people like you and Willy P…….and what is this obsession you have blacks and butts??
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:52 pm
otto,
for the same reason the cat plays with his mouse a bit before finishing it off.
American Enterprise Institute: Now With 100% Less Frum « Around The Sphere // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:54 pm
[...] David Frum at FrumForum: I have been a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute since 2003. At lunch today, AEI President Arthur Brooks and I came to a termination of that relationship. [...]
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:54 pm
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:31 pm
“otherwise, what we’ll end up with is a system like the public schools, which never function adequately.”
…..Actually Willy P….I went to private schools and then subsequently to universities where on the whole you were taught to question everything…..you, however, do look more like one of the under achieving products of the public system
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:55 pm
otto,
You are a fossil and you’ll be 6 feet under soon. Not sure why you care about politics at all…..it’s my generation that will have to live with the consequences of government run healthcare if we are not able to roll it back. Why don’t you go play Bingo and leave the politics for the adults in their prime. Thanks.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:56 pm
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:52 pm
“otto,
for the same reason the cat plays with his mouse a bit before finishing it off.”
…..That I think would be like being savaged by the proverbial Dead Sheep
marc seltzer // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:00 pm
I thought your critique of the Republican position was insightful. It’s a shame that such disagreement with the status quo wasn’t tolerated by your employer. I salute you for offering your individual insight in the face of hostility towards it. Good luck going forward.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:00 pm
Coward Robert Ford // Mar 26, 2010 at 4:55 pm
otto,
“You are a fossil and you’ll be 6 feet under soon.’
…..I’m sure you’d nominate me for attendance at one of the death panels……or will you be putting all that engineering expertise to good use operating the gas vans? …..Alas you sound like just another, but rather angrier, under achiever from the public system
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:03 pm
otto,
nah, i did very well throughout my public school days and do just fine now
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:17 pm
WillyP // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:03 pm
“otto,
nah, i did very well throughout my public school days and do just fine now”
…..It’s to be hoped you bring more intellectual rigor to your job at Acme WidgetCorp or wherever it is than is apparent here that’s all I can say
clinty11111 // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:32 pm
I don’t think either party tried to understand in detail and depth why health care costs (and hence health insurance premiums) keep rising, but Democrats have the majority and have passed a bill into law. I do find it curious that advances in medical science and technology have led to escalating costs. That is not the case in an industry I have some familiarity with: information technology. The cost of processing power, random access memory, disk storage, for example, are all far lower than they were two decades ago as a result of advances in technology and an increase in suppliers.
ottovbvs // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:43 pm
clinty11111 // Mar 26, 2010 at 5:32 pm
…..Would it surprise you to know that for years the insurance indstry through its lobbyists and the Republican party has resisted efforts to standardise IT systems and technology across the entire healthcare industry notably in the area of medical record keeping in doctor’s offices…..I first learned, to my astonishment, about this sometime in the late 90’s and in the stimulus bill that was passed early last year the insurance industry and it allies in congress fought desperately to exclude $20 billion that was included for a program of standardized record keeping in doctors offices….they failed but make no mistake about it these folks don’t want standardization because once you start assembling info on a standardized set of metrics that means you can measure and compare performance which is the last thing the insurance industry wants.
sinz54 // Mar 26, 2010 at 6:04 pm
Coward Robert Ford: You and sinz and Chek have been with Frum from day one. Does he pay you to post on here?
Frum does not pay me.
But I am seriously thinking of becoming a diarist on FrumForum, working for free of course.
If I’m going to take arrows from both the right (you) and from the left (ottovbs), I might as well do so with the official imprimatur of the blog’s moderators.