I've been following David Frum on Twitter lately. His take-downs of Mitt have been just stunning; at times I've thought "who are you, and what have you done with David Frum?". Tonight he appeared on CNN to address the leaked Mittastrophe video.
The segment was a two-party faceoff featuring David Frum and Donna Brazile. The problem - both of them have similar takes on Governor Romney's remarks.
Below, hurried rough notes:
David Frum (in response to Mary Matalin's "makers & takers" remark of yesterday): The remarks are somewhere between unfortunate and deplorable. In the middle of the worst recession since the 1930's to offer the people out of work insults? Parasites are microbes, not people. I think this is a destructive way to think. Mitt Romney should be running to be President of the whole country. If you can't be President of all the country, you won't be elected President of any of it.
Wolf: energizing base, blaah, blaah
Donna: If they find out they're part of the 47% it won't energize them. It won't energize retirees...it will not energize veterans...it won't energize low income working Americans. I don't think Mitt Romney should be applauded for saying something that insults 47% of the American people. What he said was deplorable, reprehensible and it was shocking.
Wolf: I'm surprised David, that basically you agree...
David: Candidates make a lot of mistakes...I can't get through a single day without saying something stupid and Mitt Romney's trying to get through an entire 2 year campaign. That said, if the 47% are people who don't pay income taxes, a lot of those people are Republicans. A fifth of them are retirees, one of the strongest Republican constituencies in the country and they don't pay income tax because Social Security is not taxed. I don't think this way of breaking out virtuous and unvirtuous parts of the country is helpful. There are a lot of people on Wall Street who pay a lot of income tax who have yet managed to do more damage to the finances of the United States through bad financial decisions than they'll ever repay even if they earn a billion dollars a year.
Wolf: And those people who are on Social Security, on Medicare...they paid premiums for 30 or 40 years while they were working so they were get that benefit while they retired. This isn't a freebie. They paid into that sytem...
Donna: I just want you to know if President Obama said that (Romney's statement) I would criticize him as well. I feel very strongly...that you have you have someone running for the President of the United States, that's all of us, regardless of party affiliation. And he goes out and insults...and then he doubles down on it. He acts as if the rest of us...don't care about our neighbors whether they're working or not working, they're struggling in this economy, they were struggling in the previous economy, they'll probably struggle next year, that's why we're all in this together.
Lots more where that came from. David Frum does go on to say Mitt Romney could be an excellent President, but he's spouting Conservative memes.
In all, good news for John McCain. If you can find video, please link it in the comments and I'll update the diary.
Edit: A little bit of linkage