When You Value Talking Heads More Than Governing
In a recent broadcast, Fox News performance artist Glenn Beck began targeting the academic Cass Sunstein, who is currently serving the Obama Administration inside the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. As a result, David Frum wrote a defense of Professor Sunstein, arguing persuasively that Mr. Beck’s attacks are inaccurate, and that conservatives should be thrilled by the appointment:
For those who champion free competitive markets, Cass Sunstein is about the best possible choice to be hoped for from a Democratic administration. I arrive at this opinion through first hand knowledge. I studied in one of Cass Sunstein’s seminars at Harvard Law School, and witnessed for two hours per week the fair play of his mind. But it’s not only my opinion. It’s the opinion of: Chris DeMuth, past president of the American Enterprise Institute; of the Wall Street Journal editorial page; and of the editors of Cato’s Regulation magazine…
Had Cass Sunstein somehow been stopped, the next OIRA nominee would certainly have been less favorable to markets, enterprise, and competition. The next nominee would not have supported John Roberts and Michael McConnell, would not have chaired seminars with the American Enterprise Institute, might not have been endorsed by the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, and very likely would not have shared with conservatives so many of the values that Beck purports to uphold but in fact betrays.
Mr. Frum goes on to explain why Mr. Beck’s campaign nearly did significant damage to the country, the conservative cause, and Professor Sunstein:
Republican senators know the truth about Cass Sunstein – that’s why only 33 Republican senators voted “no” on the cloture vote on his nomination, the vote that mattered. Yet unfortunately they also fear the wild disinformation broadcast by Fox News and credulously believed by millions of Fox viewers. So the final vote on the nomination of this best friend conservatives are likely ever to have inside the administration was 57-40, with only a handful of Republicans voting in favor.
Here’s where things get interesting. Having read that defense, commentator David Horowitz agrees that Mr. Beck’s attacks on Mr. Sunstein are inaccurate. “I don’t have a big quarrel with Frum’s view that Beck’s view of Cass Sunstein is ‘over the top’ or off target,” he writes, adding a sentence later, “Frum is right that Sunstein is not a raving leftist.”
So how does Mr. Horowitz characterize Mr. Frum’s post?
It is a betrayal of the conservative cause (much as his unseemly attack on Limbaugh was, too). Without voices like Beck’s and Limbaugh’s — and Ann Coulter’s for that matter — the conservative cause and the cause of this country would be hugely damaged. On the other hand, if Frum’s website were to fold, nobody would notice.
Our country is under assault by a determined, deceitful and powerful left which will stop at nothing to realize its goals. Facing them, I would rather have Glenn Beck out there fighting for our side than 10,000 David Frums who think that appeasing lefitists will make them think well of us. No it won’t. It will only whet their appetite for our heads.
Yes, that’s right, if we stop lying about Cass Sunstein the leftists will come for our heads! Only by fooling people into thinking that Professor Sunstein is a leftist radical can we save the country.
In his atrociously reasoned passage, David Horowitz is openly siding with mendacity. Having conceded that the attacks on Professor Sunstein are inaccurate, Mr. Horowitz proceeds to characterize criticism of the lies as “appeasing” leftists. How galling that he also cites Ann Coulter as a figure without whom the conservative cause would be hugely damaged. What empty nonsense. The exchange is particularly telling because Cass Sunstein is an obscure figure for most Americans. His qualifications aren’t a subject about which grassroots conservatives have pre-existing views. Any popular revolt against him would be a top down affair stoked by elites like Mr. Beck.
As it happens, Mr. Beck decided to attack Mr. Sunstein. Thus a tension arose between the degree to which conservative insights would be represented in government, on one hand, and loyalty to a conservative cable news television host on the other hand. Confronting that tension, Mr. Horowitz basically said to hell with better governance, the important thing is staying loyal to Glenn Beck. This isn’t a responsible reaction.
On redirect Mr. Frum writes:
…this right-wing Leninism exacts a terrible moral price. Notice that David Horowitz calls the left “deceitful” in his blogpost. Presumably that’s a bad thing. Likewise, when Rep. Joe Wilson shouted “You lie” at President Obama, he did not intend that as a compliment. So truth is important to conservatives, or at least we talk as if it were. Yet now David Horowitz tells me that it’s 10,000 times more important to “fight for our side.”
Not just to fight for the conservative side — but to do so via Glenn Beck!
no surprise that that is horowitz’s reaction.
— razib · Sep 15, 03:11 AM · #
You, David Frum, and Rod Dreher should start a country. Smartypantsland, population: 3.
— Lasorda · Sep 15, 04:44 AM · #
It is not difficult to imagine Sunstein serving in a moderate Republican administration, such as George H.W. Bush’s, or what McCain’s might have been if he had won in 2000 (with a rather different base of support from what he was able to attract in 2008, thanks mainly to George W. Bush, but I digress…). But their apocalyptic rhetoric notwithstanding, conservative movement leaders, especially of the circles into which Beck, Limbaugh, et al, are plugged, most likely have no more use for moderate Republicans than for the ostensible Jacobins currently in power.
— kth · Sep 15, 04:56 AM · #
Lasorda,
I’d miss my friends, but politically Rod and I could ensure there weren’t any unnecessary military adventures, and David and I could ensure that there weren’t any overzealous socially conservative policies undertaken, so I’d be pretty happy, just tending to the organic garden, I imagine. Sarah Palin would so fail in a bid for office on our island.
— Conor Friedersdorf · Sep 15, 08:42 AM · #
You know, like Mark Tushnet used to say (maybe still does), politics ain’t beanbag. Someone like Cass Sunstein, who accused the Rehnquist court of “unparalleled aggression against the national legislature,” (you could look it up) is hardly in a position to complain about harsh rhetoric.
— y81 · Sep 15, 12:32 PM · #
This is what Cass Sunstein wrote regarding animals suing:
So he did write exactly what Glenn Beck said he wrote. Your accusations of Beck on this issue are flat out wrong.
I looked at the Frum article you linked. His argument for Sunstein and against Beck is clearly a logical fallacy: an appeal to authority. Frum lists all kinds of people who like Sunstein therefore we should too. We should also favor Sunstein because he’s better than the alternatives. Please.
I will concede that Beck is blowing the animal lawsuit angle out of proportion. But Beck believes Sunstein’s beliefs are dangerous. He is basing that on, among other things, Sunstein’s association with radical groups and radical ideas.
You get internet interest by claiming to be conservative and beating up on conservatives. Beck has his shtick. His works better.
— jd · Sep 15, 12:45 PM · #
Well, well. I just went to the Horowitz article you linked—the one that Frum used to castigate Horowitz—and this is a line right after he writes that Sunstein is no “raving leftist.”:
Conor and Frum have misrepresented David Horowitz. They imply that Horowitz completely disavowed Glenn Beck’s ideas and then went on to tout Glenn Beck over 10,000 Frums. This seems dishonest, disingenuous and a whole bunch of those other big words that you use to describe Beck, Limbaugh, Palin, etc.
— jd · Sep 15, 12:58 PM · #
JD,
I don’t say that David Horowitz “completely disavowed Glenn Beck’s ideas” — not even I completely disavow Glenn Beck’s ideas. He is right about all sorts of things.
The relevant thing is that David Horowitz disavowed Glenn Beck’s ideas about Cass Sunstein, the particular subject we’re talking about here — the subject of Mr. Frum’s rebuttal and Mr. Horowitz’s subsequent comments.
— Conor Friedersdorf · Sep 15, 06:16 PM · #
Horowitz hasn’t changed a bit since the ’60s; he’s only changed ‘sides’, from the hardcore Manichaean left to the hardcore Manichaean right. He believed back then that the ends justify the means and he still believes it, and nothing as trivial as truth is going to get in his way.
— Tom Hilton · Sep 15, 07:29 PM · #
Sorry, but he didn’t, not to the extent that your outrage implies. You have misrepresented Mr. Horowitz in order to trash Mr. Beck.
— jd · Sep 15, 07:30 PM · #
Conor: you should read Horowitz’s “Art of Political War”. The title alone should indicate a big problem that we see in the conservative movement these days. If war is the proper metaphor, then, yes, we should always be trying to identify the “enemy” and fight them at every term. I just can’t muster enough cynicism (or hatred) necessary to take that approach.
— Will Hinton · Sep 15, 08:44 PM · #
Will Hinton:
I must admit that I “feel” the way you do quite often. As a Christian, I know that none of this lasts forever, so why bother fighting for a country that is just the best in a long line of failures. That’s one of the ironies of the battle between liberals and conservatives: we don’t believe any of this lasts forever. They do.
But then I think start thinking, why should I give up and turn it over to the likes of Michael Moore, or Ted Rall, or Bill Ayers or the Rev. Wright, or George Soros. That’s to say nothing of Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, Qaddaffi, or bin Laden. Why should they be able to trash this country and then inherit it?
If you can’t muster enough—I’ll call it energy—then you deserve what you get. It’s just the intentional ignorance of your cynicism that’s troubling. Is it a new thought for you that the only enemies that can really destroy us will come from within? Our “enemies” from without can’t destroy us unless we let them. Is it so cynical or “hateful” to believe that we actually have enemies who appear to be just like us?
And please, just because you refuse to “take that approach” doesn’t mean your enemies won’t. The war mentality is alive and well on the liberal side. Did you mean to imply that it was only a “big problem in the conservative movement these days?”
— jd · Sep 16, 01:10 AM · #
JD,
Is your position that any means are justified in politics? If not, where do you draw the line? When would you object to dishonesty?
— Conor Friedersdorf · Sep 16, 03:46 AM · #
Conor:
How about if I start now by objecting to your dishonesty. You’re not turning this back on me. You have been on your high moral horse about “mendacity” ever since I’ve been reading you. You and David Frum misrepresented David Horowitz’ attitude toward Glenn Beck in order to discredit both of them.
— jd · Sep 16, 12:19 PM · #