-FrumForum Goes Live
FrumForum launched itself almost exactly three years ago, on Inauguration Day 2009. Over the subsequent interval, our hundreds of contributors have reached more than 5 million individual readers. I like to think that together we have helped to move the national debate. When we launched, Sarah Palin was a leading candidate for president   more

Far from yielding an ambiguous electoral outcome, the Iowa caucuses solidly confirmed the Balkanization of the Republican Party, a fact that will lead to potential electoral failure in 2012 unless neutralized soon. These internal divisions hurt the party’s leadership in Congress in 2011; they have already improved Democratic chances to retain the Senate, gain substantial   more

Via an interesting post by Chris Conover, I came across this recently released National Health Expenditure report, which has data on health-care spending up through 2009.  This data includes a state-by-state breakdown of personal health-care spending (a number that includes direct expenditures on health-care but does not include administrative costs).  more

Byron York has a tough read on the meaning of the Iowa result for Romney.
In the end, Romney escaped humiliation, and he did it at far less cost than in 2007-2008, when he gave Iowa everything he had in his first run for the GOP nomination. “If you look back four years ago, we had   more

Result 1:
Romney wins, Santorum second, Paul third, Gingrich fourth, Perry fifth.
This is the result indicated by last day’s polling. If it eventuates, this will be a very short nominating contest. Romney will proceed to win in New Hampshire. Perry and Gingrich will try to make a last stand in South Carolina. Unless one or the   more

I attended Romney’s closing rally last night in Des Moines. Very professionally done, introduction by Senator John Thune.
Three themes really stood  out:
* Romney opened with a statement about the danger from Iran. Without mention of Ron Paul, it astutely poked at the top vulnerability of the second-polling candidate here.  more

In my column for CNN, I discuss the root causes of America’s obesity epidemic:
Obesity has become the country’s leading public health problem. Yet as we talk and talk about the issue, the country only becomes fatter and fatter.
The problem for the country echoes the problem for individuals: Willpower is not enough. “(It’s a) basic instinct,   more

Enforcement of the law prohibiting the employment of illegal immigrants, the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), enacted in 1986, has been pathetic. When the was first enacted, illegal migration from Mexico initially slowed to a trickle as Mexicans waited to see how seriously the U.S. Government would enforce IRCA.  more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. In ‘Two Cheers for the Welfare State’ David Frum responded to Yuval Levin’s essay in National Affairs about America’s welfare state.
Don’t miss Yuval Levin’s piece in the current National Affairs, “Beyond the Welfare State.”
The piece is   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. The piece by David Frum discusses whether or not the Founding Fathers would be recognized as libertarians.
Let me toss in my 5 cents worth on the question of whether the Founders were “libertarians.”
This seems to me   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. Here is Eli Lehrer’s observation on the GOP leadership.
I’m not the first to make this comment, but the current debt limit debate shows what the Tea Party movement (which I once basically supported) really values: being   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. The following reprint is of a piece by David Frum discussing the shortcomings of the Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page.
I used to write editorials for the Wall Street Journal myself, 20 years ago now.
So I’m well   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. D.R. Tucker wrote an especially provocative piece about how he changed his position on climate change and global warming.
I was defeated by facts.
It wasn’t all that long ago when I joined others on the right in   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. Kenneth Silber’s piece on the libertarian movement is especially important in light of Ron Paul’s recent surge in the polls
Last fall, I wrote for FrumForum about “How I Joined the Vast RINO Conspiracy,” tracing how I, a   more

As 2011 comes to a close, FrumForum plans to re-run some of our best featured pieces from the year. We will be running past pieces up until January 2nd of 2012. We start with an analysis of ‘Fox Geezer Syndrome’ by Richard Ramsay.
Conor Friedersdorf remembers what a pain it was to live with a liberal roommate   more

The Republican Party of Virginia is on the verge of the appearance of a significant scandal. Allegations, fueled by a post by Richard Winger at Ballot Access News, are swirling, suggesting that the Virginia GOP changed the rules for the validation of signatures in October 2011:
But what has not been reported is that in the   more

In my column for CNN, I discuss what Ron Paul tried to achieve with his infamous newsletters:
Texas congressman Ron Paul now leads among Iowa Republicans and has tied Newt Gingrich for second in New Hampshire. Republican conservatives have cycled through a series of “Not Mitts.” Is it now Paul’s turn?
Paul’s core following has been small   more

Rick Perry and Newt Gingrich’s mutual failure to qualify for the Virginia ballot raises lots of questions about their long term viability, funding, and organization. But it isn’t that surprising at all for one simple reason: neither has run for President before while the two candidates who qualified, Ron Paul and Mitt Romney, both have.  more

The more I talk to my friends across the country, the more I realize that I’m in a very unique position in terms of my unemployment—namely, that being jobless in DC is very different than it is elsewhere in the country.
“So wait,” my hometown friend Elizabeth coughed over a plate of hash browns and omelettes,   more

In 1988, Libyan terrorists, sponsored by the intelligence services of the now-deceased Muammar Qaddafi, made a bomb using a plastic explosive planted within a Toshiba cassette player with the cruelly-ironic name “Bombeat.” Twenty-three years ago today, Libyan operative Abdelbaset al Megrahi planted the device aboard Pan Am flight 103, the final leg of which was   more