NRO’s Black Sheep

Packer praises Frum:

Frum is doing something that’s quite rare across the spectrum of American politics: holding his side to the same standard as the other side. I was happy to read him firing back at his new detractors on the right; I was also happy to see him telling Rachel Maddow, of MSNBC, to elevate the tone and substance of her new talk show. Having written a mistaken book about his former boss (Frum was a speechwriter during Bush’s first term), he has reckoned with a core reason for the failure of Bush’s Presidency: the White House worshipped at the false altar of strategic communications, asserting its own version of reality rather than grappling with contrary arguments and facts. The fact that Frum is now being attacked for asking his party to stop doing the same thing shows how long the road to recovery is going to be for Republicans.