You needn't bother reading Mr. Brooks' column unless you're really starved for another 800-word slab of Sulzberger Family-funded wingnut welfare piffle from America's most consistently wrong Conservative Moral Scold.Our fixation on the awfulness of Donald Trump has distracted us from the larger problems and rendered us strangely passive in the face of them. Sure, this was a Republican failure, but it was also a collective failure. https://t.co/O9Z4FsAZtX— David Brooks (@nytdavidbrooks) July 2, 2020
OK, I'll give you one sentence. One. From a man who has been so sweepingly and reliably wrong in exactly the same way over and over again for so many decades that future generations will simply not believe that such a creature as "David Brooks" actually existed:
We’ll still have a cultural elite that knows little about people in red America and daily sends the message that they are illegitimate.And now that we've dispensed with that unpleasantness, take a moment and join me in imagining yourself to be fly on the wall during the last few contractually-obligated couples counseling sessions before America's most consistently wrong Conservative Moral Scold finally dumped his wife to take up with his much younger research assistant.
Sure doc, from one perspective the clusterfuck I made of my sacred vows is my fault, but in another, much larger sense, aren't we really all to blame?
*h/t to Alert Reader Ntodd for pointing out this most excellent analogy
No Half Measures
37 comments:
You know the really sad ass part is that some people still think DFB is a balanced, sober minded, thoughtful and insightful pundit. For someone who loves 'open debate' and 'sharing opinions in the marketplace of ideas' it's funny that you never see Brooks actually debating anyone worth a damn.
When you think very, very, deeply, aren't we all to blame for the sins of David Brooks?
A variant of the Otter Defense...
"Our fixation on the awfulness of Donald Trump and my 800 word bloobulant has distracted us from the larger problems and rendered us strangely passive in the face of them. Sure, this was a Republican failure, but it was also a collective fart the size of my ego that blew out my rectum." What I believe DFB meant to say.
I'm old enough to remember that in the 1970's and 1980's, when television or film that was Law & Order apologia wanted to stick it to the libs, the bad guy, or more often his lawyer, would declare "Yes, I/he did it. But society is to blame!"
Donald Trump is a Dope ! Period !!
Yes Mr. Brooks. A collective failure.
A republican extremism collected failure. A conservative power grab authoritative collective rule failure.
And Russia. China, Turkey and North Korea are all helping the republican collective to give your chosen one more time to make it worse.
While Brooks writes about going on Safari to hunt for the Golden Fleece that will resurrect the great white hope Chosen one.
IThis endeavor soothes his dwelling on the failure and offer the notion to him that if Trump is reelected he will finally pivot into being presidential.
I am sure Brooks thinks Trump came so close so many times and was obstructed from being presidential from those Deep State, Democratic liberal rascals.
Brooks has reached the Conservative plateau of republican Pied Pipers, Just like Charlie Sykes. The difference is not many ever bother paying heed to his precious thoughts. He is a republican club member of the right wing billionaire welfare organizations of GOP socialism. He is there to make the GOP benefactors feel secure and warm that when Brooks is printed a liberal is silence.
Difference from Charlie Sykes and say Brooks, Rush Beck. Is that Sykes wasn't a lifetime club member and the others are.
I love reading and hearing David Brook's commentary. Weaver Project is awesome!!!!!
once you get the schtick from edmund burke to rand to buckley to will to brooks it all becomes simple; tactics vary but goals are identical..
to make the oppressor feel less oppressive, it is about having a not only clear but unappreciated conscience...
we did so much, they are so ungrateful and it's never enough...
I love reading David Brooks. The people here writing these negative comments really need to get a life.
Brooks is a superb thinker. Thanks for pointing me to this.
I disagree. He publicly discussed real issues and brings into focus what conservativism represents. The debate is open to all. However slash and burn is not debate is simply ignorance.
Yada, yada, yada,ho hum.💤😴
I think Brooks is very sensible. I am puzzled by the animus in some of these columns.
David Brooks is not perfect but is one of the best conservative thinkers around in my opinion.
How could any person of integrity softsoap the damage Trump has caused? Enter David Brooks. Enough said.
I see Brooks every Friday on PBS Newshour alongside Mark Shields. He is NOT a Trump fan. When DT won the election against HC he proclaimed that Putin was the victor. If he is a conservative, he hides it very well behind his liberal rants.
"conservative thinkers"
You might want to rephrase that. Even in extinction it's an oxymoron.
"best conservative thinkers"
Comedy gold!
I mean seriously, if the Republican party is the reasonable group of Edmund Burke and William F. Buckley Jr. loving, pragmatic, center-right patriots that David Brooks sells it as in column after column, then why are 88% of them still supporting Trump, the man that David Brooks describes in column after column as being the cause of all the problems we are facing as a country? If the Republican Party is as decent and reasonable and patriotic as Brooks describes it, shouldn't they have soundly rejected Trump back in 2016 and gone with someone like John Kasich? This is the kind of scrutiny that David Brooks never gets in any public debate. Does anyone think that asking Brooks a question like that would constitute a slash and burn debate?
Bravo! Really respect David and his take on the Weavers.
Couldn’t agree with you more!
David Brooks is a pundit and writes his opinions via NYT and babbles them on PBS as well as other high profile media platforms. You won't see him debating progressives or engaging in public discussions/debates where he can be openly challenged. I'd like you to show me where that's happened. I'll grant you he does discuss issues and he does focus on what conservatism represents but it seems he's not willing to let those ideas stand on their own because he won't allow challenges to them. Challenges that, if given proper airing, would expose Brooks as a fraud. He's quite good at presenting as thoughtful and serious but the things he writes about and says are so easily argued I think he knows deep down he can't allow himself to be put in that position. And slash and burn my friend is all the Republicans use as a debate tactic. There is no conservative ideology anymore unless lower taxes and more deregulation is what passes for issues.
What you enjoy and what is insightful and educational are two different things.
I guess it's worth mentioning that anyone who thinks Brooks is a superb thinker, a man that hasn't been correct about his ideas and prognostications for over 2 decades, is necessarily a boob.
You seem like a very pleasant person so I'll respond in kind. David Brooks comes across as sensible because it's part of his image and a selling point for him. He has high profile media platforms because of it. That said, if you look past that veneer of sober mindedness and thoughtful stances you can very easily pick apart his ideas. They're really skin deep that often lack a lot of context that would work against his positions. He carries water for republicans in the end and never acknowledges the left when their points are well argued. He's really just a phony.
You don't read Brooks enough. He's a conservative make no mistake. It's very popular to be a never trumper and it gives you the leverage to be more "balanced" according to msm. This doesn't make him liberal in the slightest.
Boo, David Brooks is a self entitles twat
David Brooks is a conservative, but he is also a decent human being advocating decency for the rest of the country. I do not believe that it’s necessary to be a flaming red firebrand spewing hate speech to be a conservative or a Republican.
Dismissing Mr. Brooks out of hand because he doesn’t “debate” people you deem appropriate misses the point entirely. The work he does in building/rebuilding communities will have much longer-lasting positive results than any debate possibly could.
He’s trying to build a kinder, more civilized world. That’s is why he despises Trump, who is doing the opposite. And I wholeheartedly agree with him. We could use some actual character in our leadership. Instead we’ve got a character who should go back to reality TV.
David (anonymous) is that you?
Geez, a question like that might make Dave as concerned as Susan Collins about incivility. How on this green earth could anyone think that Brooks is a great thinker;
DFB is a shallow-thinker's idea of what a deep-thinker is.
Excellent post, Anonymous.
"David (anonymous) is that you?"
hahahaha perfect!!
(it probably is!)
Anonymous, so you're retreating to your corner with a defense of Brooks as a decent man who calls for civility in the din of rage and bile and that should justify his positions. Sorry but DB has a 20 year rap sheet full of lies, being on the wrong side of history, slandering the left when they were ultimately proved correct, opinions made out of historical context, inability to admit when he's wrong and he's a terrible writer too. No one with that record should be a public figure the way he is. If you were as bad at your job as he is you'd be fired. It's very debatable whether he's a decent human being. After all he was a cheerleader for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and his influence in the media makes him complicit in the financial debt and deaths that resulted. Not to mention he left his wife for his assistant. Brooks is a right wing shill that doles out substanceless and easily argued republican ideas.
"If you were as bad at your job as he is you'd be fired." I would argue that he is excellent at his job, it's just that his job is to muddy the waters. Confusion, obfuscation, and redirecting the focus from the perfidy of the GOP is exactly what he is paid so well to do. But it's a secret - no one will ever admit to this being the true focus of his work, although there are those lonely liberal voices out in the abyss that have been documenting this grift on the psyche of the American People and the profession of Journalism for lo these long years. But, uh, those voices don't get heard on TV or seen in the NYT. I think those voices are yelling from cornfields on the interwebs, but it's tough to know for sure because I only pay attention to the mass media. I am an American, after all....
I g I was to ever have a moment of conversation with David Brooks.
I will now have to first prioritize the question.
"what do you mean the republican failure was a collective effort"?
"Brooks is a superb thinker. Thanks for pointing me to this."
All the people who believe the above might want to try a philosophy 101 class, to be introduced to some real thinkers and writers. Just sayin'...
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