Tuesday, September 12, 2017

Today In Both Sides Do It: The Pseudo-Rabbinical Argle Bargle Of Mr. David Brooks



Here is what The New York Times paid Mr. David Brooks a large pile of money to write today:
Atlantis: A Land of Contrasts.

Noah.

Noah.

Noah.

Noah.

Noah. 
Noah. 
Noah. 
Both Sides!

Why won't Obama lead?

What?  You think I'm kidding?

From Mr. David Brooks in The New York Times today
Harvey, Irma, Jose … and Noah.
And we're off...
Is there anything we can learn from hurricanes, storms and floods?

People have been asking that question for thousands of years, and telling stories that try to make sense of natural disasters. These flood myths are remarkably similar to one another...

The most famous story, of course, is the biblical story of Noah. As the story begins, the human race is living without law, and as a result is living violently and badly. But there was one righteous man, Noah...

 God tells Noah to build an ark...

What does Noah say when he hears this?

Rabbis and scholars have often judged Noah harshly for this...

“Noah was righteous but not a leader,” Rabbi Jonathan Sacks observes...

Noah and his family get on the ark and Noah gently cares for the animals...

What does Noah do now? Once again, Noah is silent...

Once again, the rabbis are critical of Noah’s passivity...

Now God gives Noah a covenant...

Noah is a good man, but his story is a lesson in the dangers of blind obedience...
And here is the key paragraph: the razor in the apple of virtually every single thing The New York Times pays Mr. David Brooks to write:
..That’s because we have trouble thinking about authority. Everybody seems to have an outsider mentality. Social distrust is at record highs. Many seem to swerve between cheap, antiestablishment cynicism, on the one hand, and a lemming-like partisan obedience on the other.

Floods are invitations to recreate the world. That only happens successfully when strong individuals are willing to yoke themselves to collective institutions...
In other words, floods, boy, I don't know.

The one salvageable metaphor from this puddle of awful is the image the ark.

Because once again that is exactly what David Brooks and the rest of the Beltway media drivel-mongers are building for themselves and their friends, right out in the open where everyone can see. Another great big Both Siderist lifeboat -- just like the one they built after President Cheney lied us into the wrong war, just like the one they built after the Bush Administration collapsed, just like the one they built after the GOP chose to deal with the election of the first black president with a relentless, unified campaign of slander and sedition -- on which they plan to once again sail away unscathed from yet another catastrophe for which they bear a huge amount of responsibility.

This is what we're up against:

And without massive and concerted push-back, they will absolutely get away with it once again.



Behold, a Tip Jar!

15 comments:

Peter Janovsky said...

What's really depressing is how many rabbis will be quoting that Brooks piece this Rosh Hashonah and Yom Kippur. Our past Rabbi used "Character" as his basis for a high holiday sermon and I almost became a Zoroastrian (even tho I can't)
We have a new rabbi now. Will be praying for one thing.

D. said...

"God tells Noah to build an ark...

What does Noah say when he hears this?"


"Who is this really?"

trgahan said...

"That only happens successfully when strong individuals are willing to yoke themselves to collective institutions..."

Mr. Brook's,

President Barack Obama was the most recent one who did what you describe and you disavowed him as "suckering you" on the pages of the NYT.

FYI...He had to do it repeatedly while your party set out to destroy him by setting fire to the nation over and over again. The elected representatives of your party are still trying to turn disaster relief into a debt ceiling-eque political apparatus for punishing/rewarding the voting habits of U.S. citizens.

Neo Tuxedo said...

NOAH.

Yes, Lord?

HOW LONG CAN YOU TREAD WATER?

Robt said...

If God told R-cons to build an Ark after or during "making storms great and devastating again.

Think they would reply; "this is not the time to talk about it".

Talk about Freedom for a second.
Your paid representative tells you, when you can speak and when they might consider listening to you.

What is Brooks going prices to sell out America?

Is there a American discount vs the Russian price?

dinthebeast said...

So let me get this straight: He just blamed the biblical flood on the hippies?
Makes sense, what else would he do? It's not like he has a lot of usable options or anything.

-Doug in Oakland

Peter Janovsky said...

"What's a cubit?"

(best not to disclose the source of the bit.)

Peter Janovsky said...

"What's a cubit?"

(best not to disclose the source of the bit.)

Mark said...

Dear Driftglass,
Thank you for your long service reporting from atop the watchtower of sanity overlooking the incessant fuckery of David Brooks and his ilk.

So what do we do to combat the return of the 'Bush-off Machine' rebranded as the 'Trump-off Machine' by Sylvester McMonkey McBrooks this time around? Would using a hashtag like #BothSideristArk or #BothSidesDont or something to tag every weasely utterance made by conservative public intellectual Noahs as they wash that trump right out of their hair.

Twitter can at least be leveraged to keep track of every bullshit dishonest smoke screen they lay down to conceal their escape from the catastrophe they were paid handsomely to aid and abet.

Any thoughts on how to #label a spotlight on the MSM rat lines as the conservative propagandist's swarm away from their latest disaster?

bluicebank said...

"God tells Noah to build an ark...

What does Noah say when he hears this?"

---

"Where are the sails?"

Robt said...

I wait patiently for the DFB column that sets me on the Conservative moral compass that allows legal prostitution in Nevada. He can start by interviewing pat Robertson of why it is OK for republicans to ignore this sin?

Mr morals could explain the free market economics of capitalism on this one.

Tom Shefchik said...

All the commentors at another site today were savaging Charlie Sykes for his recent conversion. Your wisdom is spreading. Hopefully their arks will be leaky this time, they should all drown in their failed policies.

Robt said...

Question for DFB,

If bothsides do "it".

Then there is no other side, right?

Like how Trump ran around groping during his life and Obama didn't.

It may be a bit sciency, Geometrically not possible to be a libtard dirty stinking hippie and also being a White supremacist NAZI republican conservative.
Just saying.

RW said...

So, like I didn't need to be told this, all their talk of being pro-life is just PR for their distaste and dislike of other people.

For a GOP operative to openly declare floods as 'perfect opportunities to fix things' is openly declaring their contempt and hatred of those below them.

Where is the pro-life in that? The compassion? The humanity? The 'adulthood'?

When does the GOP/trumpian brain trust substitute troops, or a nuke, polluted water, roaming gangs of thugs, for the idea of a 'flood'?

So their 'war on regulation' is all about 'population control'.

Nice 'family values'...

jim said...

"... in conclusion, water is a land of contrasts."