David Frum

{{bronze}}[[File:David Frum.jpg|thumb|right|David Frum on BloggingHeads.tv, November 2007.]]{{Pundits}}
{{hatnote|No relation to [[John Frum]], 
of course
 we hope.}}

'''David Frum''' {{lived|1960}} is a [[conservative]] writer and [[pundit]]. He was born in Toronto, Ontario, the son of [[CBC]] journalist Barbara Frum.


Frum came to prominence in 2002 through his wife Danielle, who just ''had'' to e-mail her friends and family because she was so proud that husband David (who is [[Jewish]]) helped fuel the [[Christian fundamentalist]]-driven foreign policy lingo of [[George W. Bush]].

==Dear World, Danielle hearts David==
{{cquote|I realise this is very 'Washington' of me to mention but my husband is responsible for the axis of evil segment in Tuesday's state of the union address. It's not often a phrase one writes gains national notice... so I hope you'll indulge my wifely pride in seeing this one repeated in headlines everywhere!|||quote from Danielle Frum's e-mail to the [[Internet]]<ref>[http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/feb/27/usa.matthewengel Proud wife turns 'axis of evil' speech into a resignation letter] ''The Guardian'' 27 February 2002</ref>}}
Frum was the man who wrote "[[Axis of Evil]]" in Bush's 2002 State of the Union address.  So yes, it's his fault.  

After Danielle's wifely boast, David left the [[White House]].  Debate ensued over whether he resigned of his own volition, or whether he was pushed out for his wife's commission of the cardinal [[sin]] of a speechwriter taking credit for a [[politician]]'s speech.  

Between 2002 and 2010, David Frum wrote a lot of boring stuff, did a lot of boring stuff, started a vanity project called ''FrumForum'' and took a position at the [[American Enterprise Institute]], which has served as the [[Republican]] Ministry of [[Propaganda]].

==Frum returns to reality==
[[Stephen Colbert]] showed why he has a Peabody Award for [[journalism]] by handing David Frum his ass in October 2008.<ref>https://www.cc.com/video/bfif72/the-colbert-report-david-frum</ref>  Frum was on Colbert's show to promote ''Comeback'', his latest "I Know How to Save the Republican Party" book talking the truth about how the Bush-era was disastrous for the conservative movement.  Problem?  He not only was part of that era, he had ''praised'' it, calling Bush's leadership "[[Lulz|nothing short of superb]]" in a 2003 book. In the new book, Frum had some [[Stopped clock|good ideas]], but Colbert nailed him repeatedly for his dramatic shift to critic.  Frum mostly fumbled through answers to questions like, "How does leadership become superb one day, and not the other?" and "Can we [[tax cut]] our way out of our present [fiscal] problem?" Frum admitted to proudly voting for Bush in [[2004 US Presidential Election|2004]], but struggled to explain the difference between 2004 George Bush and 2008 George Bush, whose policies he was now criticizing in the new book.

American [[liberal]]s, always desperate for some — ''any'' — signs of reason in the [[neoconservative]] movement, generally applauded Frum's shift.

==Reality fires Frum==
In 2010, Frum dared to question the [[Senate]] Republicans' strategy to block anything [[Obama]], particularly [[Obamacare|healthcare reform]], and he was promptly fired from the AEI for expressing his own thoughts.<ref>[http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/25/frum-forced-out-at-conservative-institute/ Frum Forced Out at Conservative Institute] ''The Caucus (The New York Times)'' 25 March 2010</ref>  It didn't really matter to AEI because his co-workers complained that Frum [[Wingnut welfare|rarely showed up for work]].<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20190115194424/http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/03/25/frums-fall-is-the-rights-loss/ Frum’s Fall is the Right’s Loss] ''NewsReal Blog'' 25 March 2010 (archived from the original on 15 January 2019)</ref> (This was likely because Frum was a figurehead and spokesperson, not one of the people actually writing up propaganda.)

==David returns to unreality==
As of 2012, David joined other wingnuts and authoritarians<ref>[http://www.theweedblog.com/who-are-the-biggest-opponents-of-marijuana-legalization/ Who Are The Biggest Opponents Of Marijuana Legalization?] ''The Weed Blog'' 2 November 2014</ref> in opposing 
reefer madness
 the increasingly successful movement to legalize cannabis in the U.S. David cannot sleep nights because, of all the many serious issues plaguing humankind, this looms:  "half the states in the union may soon allow the sale of [[marijuana]] to almost anybody determined to buy it."<ref>[http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/10/opinion/frum-big-marijuana-cv/?hpt=hp_bn7 Be afraid of Big Marijuana] ''CNN'' 10 September 2013</ref> 

For our man Frum, imagining a world in which his fellow citizens are not arrested and locked in cages for using or selling a weed whose use doesn't kill anyone is at least as bad as the Axis of Evil ever was. So, preventing such a nightmare is his primary issue these days, and  he "regularly posts anti-pot rhetoric to his 100,000-plus Twitter followers."<ref>[http://mic.com/articles/93644/these-are-the-9-biggest-enemies-of-weed-legalization#.GfbPS4pZW These Are the 9 Biggest Enemies of Weed Legalization] ''Mic'' 16 July 2014</ref>

==David returns to reality... again (well, somewhat)==
Frum has been one of the staunchest conservative opponents of [[Donald Trump]] from the start and shows zero signs of letting up now, and outright denounced [[Steve Bannon|Steven Bannon]] for being an obvious [[racist]].<ref>{{a|https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/798010026292105216|David Frum on Twitter}} 14 November 2016</ref> You can [https://twitter.com/davidfrum?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor check his twitter feed] for his constant stream of sick burns against Trump, which is what he's best known for at the moment. 

Nonetheless, he maintains the usual wingnut views on "campus free speech," the criminalization<ref>{{a|https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1009392288072634371|David Frum on Twitter}} 20 June 2018</ref> of [[cannabis]] and warlike foreign policy beliefs. Along with Max Boot, he has been noted as a grifter and an opportunist by anyone who remembers his previous antics.<ref>[https://theoutline.com/post/2079/things-are-bad-and-david-frum-makes-them-worse?zd=1&zi=ilfqgn7t Things are bad, and David Frum makes them worse] ''The Outline'' 10 August 2017</ref>

==References==
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Categories: Canadians, Chickenhawks, Living people, Political pundits, Right-wing activists