57 Crises and Nothing On

David Brooks and Gail Collins burn a dozen NYT column inches reprising a scene from "Thirty Two Short Films About a Still Photograph of Several Species Of Government Officials Gathered Together In A Cave And Grooving With a Pict: A Love Story” in one of the most amazingly insipid columns I have read in a long while.

Honestly, at first I though it was a joke.

Here is a better version which, from a distance, I swear is indistinguishable from the original (Actual remarks from the original are so noted.)


David Brooks: Gail, I think it was Karl Marx who said "Duck... duck... duck... duck... duck...... duck...... goose!"

Gail Collins: I believe Marx made that remark at the premier of “Das Kapital VI: The Proletariat Take Vegas.” (actual remark)

David Brooks: The White House has just announced that it will not release the photo of the dead Bin Laden. At this point, my Republican Party is only accepting “Inception”-level proofs of anything Obama says about anything. If Obama is willing to spin bin Laden’s decapitated head around on a table – live, in Fox News – and it tips over after a few seconds, they would be willing to accept that as provisional proof that OBL really is dead thanks to the hard work of George W. Bush.

Gail Collins: I kind of think that if you show conspiracy theorists a photo of the dead Bin Laden they will come up with an explanation for why it’s really a photo-shopped picture of Bin Laden asleep. Or his dead cousin Fred. Donald Trump apparently believes that Bin Laden is dead, so that ought to be enough for the Middle East. (actual remark)

David Brooks: Given my track record of getting everything wrong about everything, this is probably not a subject people like me should be passing judgment on. Nonetheless, observe now how I do it anyway.

Gail Collins: I couldn’t help noticing. Aren’t you afraid of frightening little children?

David Brooks: Outside of my own children and the little stick figures I invent in my terrible books, I do not accept these “children” as you call them actually exist. All I see are tiny, tiny Socialists. I will now collect another political product placement paycheck by gratuitously working “Israel” into our “conversation.”

Gail Collins: As long as you buy be lunch. Remind me again why we do this horribly stilted “conversation” thingie once a week?

David Brooks: I believe is has something to do with our marginal costs versus the price hiring a new writer to write new stuff. Hey, speaking of pictures, looking at a single still photo of Obama’s crisis team, I couldn’t help being reminded that people in gummint sometimes make hard decisions. On a human level I’m struck by the fact that photographs show people’s faces. Also that, while Bob Gates appears to tie his tie full-Windsor, Denis McDonough looks very four-in-hand, and John Brennan appears to favor clip-ons. I suspect many of you human will relate to this.

Gail Collins: Your intimate knowledge of the sartorial habit of the Washington Power Elite make you even more credible!

David Brooks: I’m also hoping it will make more human females want to mate with me.

Gail Collins: Did they have to pick the one where Hillary had her hand over her mouth? The secretary of state doesn’t need to prove her toughness, but it would be nice if the definitive photo didn’t show the only woman in the room looking stricken. (actual remark)

David Brooks: The second thing the photo shows is how small the room is. I assumed they would be working in a TARDIS, or under a big, fake volcano, or on a wide open savannah, or in the Thunderdome, or inside that VGER thing from that crappy first Star Trek movie.. It is confusing to me. Then again, maybe they are in a miniature room or have all been rendered temporarily gigantic. Truly, crowded workspaces teach humility.

Also, that couch and chair arrangement looks distinctly like the one that human actors on the “Bob Newhart Show” used during that program’s successful television run. I believe that configuration in the photograph is designed to convey a sense that “The doctor is in” in a lighthearted and comforting way to the humans who see this photo.

Gail Collins: The president really did put all his chips on the line. These are the kind of moments we elected him for — we knew from the financial crisis that when all hell breaks loose, he doesn’t lose his cool. (actual remark)
…

David Brooks: In the case of Obama’s perch in the Situation Room, I think what happened is this. Biden had been down in the mess all afternoon just pounding the cheddar and liverwurst. The President had told him to cool it, but you know how Biden can be once he starts getting his wusrt freak on. And so by showtime, Vice President SBD is basically a Hindenburg with hair-plugs, cracking off one-cheek daisy-cutters right and left. So finally, Obama pulls rank and calls the corner seat, which is right under the AC blower, thus shielding himself from the Joecano. After that, he just let his people sort out proximity to Biden by rank or status or olfactory sensitivity.

He’s very hands-off that way: not at all like Carter. Much more Reaganesque!

Gail Collins: The careful observer will also note that that there is not a Mac in the fucking room. Suck it, Steve Jobs!

David Brooks: Macs are elite, Left Coast computers that Real Americans just don’t trust. This was Obama’s way of distancing himself from the extremist base in his own Party and aligning himself with the independent and swing voters, and disaffected Republicans.

Next Week: What the decline in the popularity of the Baby Ruth bar can tell us about the 2012 election.