David Frum Tells Conservatives to Not Despair

David Frum addressed this CNN article to conservatives, but it should also be addressed to libertarians.

"The United States did not vote for socialism."

Don't despair he says, and how right he is:

Compare the United States of 2012 to the United States of 1962. Leave aside the obvious points about segregation and discrimination, and look only at the economy.

In 1962, the government regulated the price and route of every airplane, every freight train, every truck and every merchant ship in the United States. The government regulated the price of natural gas. It regulated the interest on every checking account and the commission on every purchase or sale of stock. Owning a gold bar was a serious crime that could be prosecuted under the Trading with the Enemy Act. The top rate of income tax was 91%.

It was illegal to own a telephone. Phones had to be rented from the giant government-regulated monopoly that controlled all telecommunications in the United States. All young men were subject to the military draft and could escape only if they entered a government-approved graduate course of study. The great concern of students of American society -- of liberals such as David Riesman, of conservatives such as Russell Kirk, and of radicals such as Dwight Macdonald -- was the country's stultifying, crushing conformity.

It is unclear with whom libertarians should align at this moment in our nation's political history, and many split the difference by aligning with Obama and Boehner. Reid, by the way, is just the impeachment nonsense stopper.

We have crossed a line, and it isn't about makers and takers. Too many women voted Democratic on the single issue of reproductive freedom for the last two Republican nominees to reach Presidential viability.

As far as the Hispanic immigration menace, I'm not worried. A full 40% of my nieces and nephews are Hispanic. Akin and Mourdock can't be blamed for losing the Hispanic vote.

Election returns are the one objective fact in politics. But still, even after 2012, I suspect Republican candidates will continue to self-abort and self-deport.