{"id":484531,"date":"2010-03-29T11:36:27","date_gmt":"2010-03-29T15:36:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/climateprogress.org\/?p=21991"},"modified":"2010-03-29T11:36:27","modified_gmt":"2010-03-29T15:36:27","slug":"honey-i-shrunk-the-gop-part-5-so-much-for-the-american-enterprise-institute-being-a-%e2%80%9cthink%e2%80%9d-tank-bush-advisor-slams-aei-the-closing-of-the-conservative-mind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/484531","title":{"rendered":"Honey, I shrunk the GOP, Part 5: So much for the American Enterprise Institute being a \u201cthink\u201d tank – Bush advisor slams AEI: “The Closing Of The Conservative Mind”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"http:\/\/climateprogress.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/07\/shrunkthegop1.jpg\"Sure the American Enterprise Institute is still crazy with climate denial and delay after all these years<\/a>.\u00a0 And sure it recently compared EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to Clint Eastwood and carbon polluters to criminals<\/a>.\u00a0 But it always retained the semblance of a serious think tank.<\/p>\n

Heck, back in October, Steven F. Hayward, \u201cthe F.K. Weyerhaeuser fellow at the American Enterprise Institute\u201d wrote:<\/p>\n

\n

The brain waves of the American right continue to be erratic, when they are not flat-lining.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

He’s still got a job at AEI.\u00a0 I guess that sort of truth is okay to utter.<\/p>\n

But while AEI scholars can question the lack of ideas in the entire conservative “movement,” apparently they can’t question GOP tactics, as TP’s Faiz Shakir explains in Bartlett: Frum\u2019s Dismissal Shows \u2018All That Matters Now Is Absolute Subservient Adherence\u2019 To The GOP<\/a>: <\/a><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Former Bush speechwriter David Frum \u2014 who famously authored the phrase \u201caxis of evil<\/a>\u201d \u2014 has been unceremoniously forced out from the American Enterprise Institute<\/a> (AEI), a right wing, neoconservative think tank. Frum\u2019s dismissal resulted from criticism he directed at the Republican Party for staking a failed strategic posture of \u201cno compromise<\/a>\u201d on health care. As a result, \u201cit\u2019s Waterloo all right: ours,\u201d Frum wrote to his fellow conservatives.<\/p>\n

Right-wing donors<\/a> of AEI began raising concerns about Frum. So, AEI president Arthur Brooks took Frum out to lunch this week to tell him that, while he valued \u201ca diversity of opinion,\u201d he wanted to downgrade Frum to a nonsalaried position<\/a>. Frum declined the offer and posted a letter of resignation<\/a> on his personal website.<\/p>\n

Bruce Bartlett, a former economic adviser to President Bush, suffered a similar fate as Frum. After leaving the Bush White House, Bartlett authored<\/a> a book<\/a> titled Imposter: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy<\/em>. That book led to his dismissal in 2005<\/a> as a senior fellow at a conservative Texas-based think tank called the National Center for Policy Analysis<\/p>\n

On his personal blog, Bartlett referred to Frum\u2019s departure from AEI as \u201cthe closing of the conservative mind<\/a>.\u201d He elaborated further this morning on C-Span\u2019s Washington Journal:<\/p>\n

BARTLETT: [W]hat\u2019s really going on here is that adherence to conservative principles has been \u2013 is out the window now. All that matters now is absolute subservient adherence to the Republican Party line of the day.<\/strong> And that\u2019s what got David into trouble. He was critical, not even of Republican principles, but of Republican tactics on the health care debate. And now, even that is considered, you know, you can\u2019t say that or you lose your job.<\/p>\n

Watch it:<\/p>\n

<\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

On his blog, Bartlett rips AEI: \u201cThe organization has lost an enormous amount of credibility by firing him and hiring Republican political hacks like Marc Thiessen<\/a>. That\u2019s a statement I will never need to retract.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal<\/em> criticized Frum earlier this week: “Mr. Frum now makes his living as the media’s go-to basher of fellow Republicans<\/a>, which is a stock Beltway role. But he’s peddling bad revisionist history that would have been even worse politics.”<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I think it has been obvious for a while that the conservative movement should be renamed the conservative stagnation:<\/p>\n