The New York Times' David Brooks Algorithm...

...returns to its asshole Both Siderist default settings.

For your consideration, here a couple of screen shot triptychs (don't you love it when a word that has no business existing in the first place like "triptych" actually does exist and drops in right when you need it?) from the PBS News Hour Brooks & Capehart segments.   

This one is from January 15, 2021 assembled by me.

And this one takes place a week later on January 22, 2021, where the PBS techs saved me the work of piecing it together by placing all three participants -- David Brooks, Jonathan Capehart and the moderator Judy Woodruff -- side-by-side.  Thanks guys!

As you can see, each week, instead of being seated in a teevee studio together, the participants are each in their own homes.  This has been PBS policy since March of last year when Judy Woodruff introduced the segment this way:

...

Now, to help make sense of a week that doesn't seem real to many of us, we turn to the analysis of Shields and Brooks. That is syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.

And neither one of you is here with me. We are keeping you at what we think is a safe distance, but we're so glad that you're here.

David, how do we make sense of this, you know, things going on that I think most of us could never have imagined?

Now of course you already know this since virtually all news programs of any kind have been programmed this way for nearly a year now in order to protect the health of the people both in front of and behind the camera against the COVID-19 pandemic which continues ravaging our county and massively disrupting our lives.  Packing people into enclosed spaces for hours a day still carries an unacceptably high risk, especially in environments where some people are not always diligent about mask discipline and you can never be 100% sure that others aren't asymptomatic spreaders.  

Which is why, week after week, if you watched (which I cannot discourage you from doing strongly enough) you'd have found Mr. Brooks collecting his PBS paycheck working from home, spouting his insipid homilies from the safety of his hermetically-sealed Lincoln Park mansion, seated comfortably at a desk with his creepily color-coded bookshelf in the background (who but a sociopath does this?).  

Because his employers at PBS do not think it is safe for their on-air talent to be in the studio.  

Because that's how viruses work.

And I like to think that Mr. Brooks was perched in that very spot when he decided it was just a super good idea to let rip with another steaming pile of Brooks-brand Both Siderism.  This time his Liberal targets are those terrible teacher's unions who are selfishly standing in the time way of children being [checks notes] packed into enclosed spaces for hours a day in environments where some people are not always diligent about mask discipline and you can never be 100% sure that others aren't asymptomatic spreaders.  

Republicans have been repulsive of late. But sometimes some progressive organizations can still be selfish stinkers. https://t.co/KIv7pijw1c

— David Brooks (@nytdavidbrooks) January 29, 2021

And

Readers, many of us got involved in the Black Lives Matter marches last summer. Do Black lives matter to you only when they serve your political purpose? Shouldn’t we be marching to get Black and brown children back safely into schools right now? https://t.co/KIv7pijw1c

— David Brooks (@nytdavidbrooks) January 29, 2021

So here's my thing.  My mom was a teacher.  My dad was a principal.  When they divorced, eventually mom married another teacher and dad married another principal.  My sister was a teacher.  Her first husband was a teacher.  My uncle was a teacher/coach at DePaul.  My former mother-in-law was a teacher.  And I taught college for several years.  I could go on and on and as long as I'm doing the family tree, my brother is a chef at a senior extended care facility where every employee is tested several times a week because if the virus got in it would tear through the place, and where the head of the facility and several employees had to go into quarantine because members of their families got just a little bit careless once.

Because that's how viruses work.

And that goes double for the new variants which are already stalking the land.  

So perhaps you can imagine how many explicit, bloodthirsty, Twitter-banishment-worthy expressions of contempt came unbidden to the tip of my tongue while reading David Brooks' worthless twaddle about why teachers should be forced back into the classroom now!now!now! But it turns out, it's not necessary to let fly with those because the commentary ratio that came down on Mr. Brooks like the wrath of Zeus, in both the NYT comment section and on social media, has already been awe-inspiring.

I picked out a few representative samples like this

My favorite part is when you link to two studies that both say researchers are unable to establish how much infection transmission happens in schools in high-infection rate areas because of a lack of contact tracing.  Without it, the researchers cannot establish if a child or teacher got the disease from school or outside of it.  So that's why you can find research saying "its safe to go back to school with proper precautions and low community infection rates" but not studies saying its unsafe when the infection rate is high. This and other caveats appears to be the main focus of the two studies linked in the article, but instead we're told they prove its all safe now so teachers should shut up and get back to work.  That you manage to get through an entire essay without addressing the effects on teachers that you expect to be the backbone of this system says everything. 

And this:

Often I agree with the opinions of Mr. Brooks, but I'm amazed to see that the word "vaccine" did not appear even once in this column.  My husband and I are both elementary school teachers, with two kids of our own at home learning online. Our last day of  brick-and -mortar instruction was March 13, 2020.  Between us we have taught black and brown (and some white) children for 43 years. Please don't tell me black and brown lives don't matter to us! 

And this:

72 NYC DOE employees died of Covid last March and April.  That's a lot of people.  And schools were closed from the middle of March.  We have uncontrolled community spread in this country, and that's one of the main problems.  In the EU, when rates have gotten anywhere near ours, they've closed the schools.  School is, by definition, a congregate indoor poorly ventilated setting.  Period.  It is completely different from any other profession mentioned by anyone here.

And this:

I’m am American in Vancouver, British Columbia. Strong teachers’ union. Socialist (NDP) government. Schools are open. Public schools. COVID-19 cases per capita here are much lower than in most US states. What Mr Brooks describes is madness.

And this:

I am a teacher, Mr. Brooks. It’s simple really: If you give me the vaccine, I’ll go back the day after my second dose has had enough time to do its thing. The day after.

If we are so vital to the economy and the development of children, moving us to the front of the vaccine line shouldn’t be a problem. As it currently stands, I won’t be vaccinated until May. May!

I think that remote learning is a disaster, but a small one when compared to the alternative.

If I have to read one more teacher Covid obituary and then read one more article by a non-educator that essentially wants to write mine, I’m going to lose it!

Will any of dislodge Mr. Brooks from the sinecure at The New York Time he was gifted decades ago for his [checks notes] unstinting support of the Iraq War and his praising-without-ceasing of George W. Bush's military and economic genius?

Of course not.  As a beloved house-pet of the Sulzgberger family, he can keep his cozy place at their little family newspaper pumping out bilge like this as long as he pleases.

But this does not mean that those who have, at long last, come to see him as the morally bankrupt charlatan that he has always been are not deserving of praise and encouragement, so keep up the good work humans!

No Half Measures