Left-wing Republican David Frum described himself as “a man of the right” on Monday while participating in a discussion panel on left-wing and Democrat-aligned MSNBC.
Frum advised his fellow leftists and Democrats to narrow their demands of Republicans to “two asks;” 1. A new law requiring the Treasury Department to release the tax returns of Donald Trump (and presumably future presidents), and 2. The establishment of an independent commission to investigate allegations of Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election.
Madelyn Albright and Michael Chertoff were described as “competent intelligence professionals” by Frum, who recommended that the two former government officials lead an inquiry into “what happened in the 2016 election:”
“Look, there’s this vast ferment of activism that is bubbling up in the country and a lot of it from viewers of this network. I’m not a person — I’m a person of the right. I still am. I’m probably — I have different views on the capital gains tax from most of the people viewing this program tonight. What I would be beseech those who want to do something constructive: focus on two asks. Where other movements in the past like Occupy Wall Street have fallen apart, is they had 900 asks. If you have 900 asks, you have none. There are only two. The treasury should release the president’s tax returns, and that should be a law, and there should be an independent commission headed by competent intelligence professionals. I nominate Madelyn Albright and Michael Chertoff to do an independent investigation with subpoena power of what happened in the 2016 election. Ask those two things. That’s enough.”
As evidence of his right-wing bona fides, Frum claimed to hold an attitude towards taxation of capital gains different than most of MSNBC’s audience.
Last November, Frum penned an article entitled, “The Conservative Case for Voting for Clinton,” describing Hillary Clinton as a “patriot” who would protect “the republic and the Constitution.”
Weeks ago, Frum claimed that Trump’s presidency remains a function of a “hostile intelligence operation” executed by Russia at the direction of its president, Vladimir Putin.
Last week, Frum joined Democrats and the broader left in advising them how best to “resist” Trump.
Frum belongs to a cadre of left-wing Republicans bandied around left-wing and Democrat-aligned media outlets to provide an illusion of political and partisan balance. Nonthreatening to the dominant narratives of Democrats and the broader left, they amount to controlled opposition. Such left-wing Republicans mostly claim political bona fides via experience with political campaigns and/or Republican politics.
MSNBC is attempting to rebrand itself as an objective and nonpartisan news outlet, dropping an earlier used promotional slogan – “Lean Forward” – which made overtures to neo-Marxist “progressive” politics.
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