Recently, I cited David Frum's long article about Neo-Consevatives (Frum being one) versus Paleo-Conservatives (Bob Novak being one). Here Bob Novak reviews Frum's new book about his experiences as a speech writer in the Bush White House.
Senior colleagues say Frum had personal contact with Bush on no more than three or four occasions, and he does not seem to understand George W. Bush very well. Of a president who may be more basically conservative than Ronald Reagan, Frum writes, “He was not at all an ideological man.” He contends Bush “does curiously resemble [John F.] Kennedy”; as someone who knew both, I can think of no two more dissimilar men.
Novak seems to spend much of the review defending the President from a "disloyal" Frum. Novak, of course, was mentioned a few times in Frum's last article. Now that conservatives control Congress and the White House the only war left is the ideological one. The infighting seems more vigorous than the fighting between the parties. I think the Neos will win out, because a world economy is going to mean engagement. We could always isolate ourselves before the days of emerging markets and American investment in foreign lands. But the world is different now. In fact, that investment is what will keep us a world power and give us the ability to defend ourselves.
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