A week after air-brushing himself and the rest of his Neocon cronies completely out of history, and kinda-sorta exonerating the Bush Administration for Ira because Both Sides, here is what David Brooks would like the kids of America to know about growth, success and morality (with emphasis added):
...I could think of some other growth structures. In some domains progress comes like a stairway. There’s a period of stagnation, followed by a step upward, followed by a period of stagnation, followed by another step. In other domains, progress comes like waves repetitively lapping the shore. You go over some material and the wave leaves a residue of knowledge; then you go over the same material again and the next wave leaves a bit more residue.Yet other other domains follow a valley-shaped curve. You have to go down initially before you can go up. The experience of immigrating to a new country can be like this; you have to start at the bottom as you learn a new society before you can make your way upward. Moral progress is like this, too. You have to go down and explore your own failures before you can conquer them. You have to taste humiliation before you can aspire toward excellence.Thinking about growth structures reminds you that really successful people often have the ability to completely flip their mental dispositions. In many fields, it pays to be rigid and disciplined at first, but then flexible and playful as you get better. If you go into politics, you have to make the transition from campaigning, which is an instantly gratifying activity, to governing, which is an exponential activity, requiring experience, patience and hard-earned wisdom....
Because David, while a really nice guy, is also the Devil.
4 comments:
I wonder what he thinks humiliation tastes like? Oh, oops, I used that word again. Nothing rising to the level of thought is actually occurring there.
-Doug in Oakland
Driftglass,
I could think of some other Growth structures starting with piles of incredibly gooey obtuse bullshit. In some domains progress comes like a giant sink hole. There’s a period of stagnation, followed by a small opening, followed by a few thing getting sucked into it, followed by a massive expansion and everything gets sucked into it. In other domains, progress comes like a tsunami sucking away the water from the beach. You go over some material and the tsunami comes roaring in and wipes the fuck out of everything in its path and leaves a little residue of meaningless debris; then you go over the same material again and the next tsunami leaves even more meaningless debris and residue.
Thinking about growth structures as outlined by DFB reminds you that really shitty columnists often have the ability to completely flip their mental distortions into greater mental disorders. In many fields it pays to be informed and knowledgeable, but then in DFBs case it pays to be lazy, ill-informed, and write driveling bullshit, and be seemingly oblivious of his own retched, rotted growth structure.
“…campaigning, which is an instantly gratifying activity…” and “exponential activity” What in the blue fuck is that shit.
I’m sure the letters used to create the words in DFB’s driveling growth structure salad must be embarrassed to be used in such a manner.
Nothing wipes away the taste of humiliation like a piece of rhubarb pie.
@Fred: Yes, but it's always best if it's Beboparebop Rhubarb Pie.
Sadly, I think the amount of it Brooks would need to take the taste of fear and humiliation out of his mouth if he ever had the epiphany that showed how badly he's fucked up everything short of tying his own shoes would be beyond the LD50 for rhubarb.
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