It's The Great Republican Renaissance, Charlie Brown

"Jam Tomorrow and Jam Yesterday, but Never Jam Today"  -- Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass; and What Alice Found There

About every six months, give or take, since St. Ronald Reagan ascended bodily to Republican heaven, Mr. David Brooks of The New York Times has written more-or-less the same column prophesying the Great Republican Renaissance that is always just around the corner.

Example:  

"The big Republican accomplishment is that they have detoxified their brand. Four years ago they seemed scary and extreme to a lot of people. They no longer seem that way. The wins in purple states like North Carolina, Iowa and Colorado are clear indications that the party can at least gain a hearing among swing voters. And if the G.O.P. presents a reasonable candidate (and this year’s crop was very good), then Republicans can win anywhere. I think we’ve left the Sarah Palin phase and entered the Tom Cotton phase."  -- David Brooks, November 5, 2014.

Then, after about six months, with zero sign of a renaissance and the GOP getting exponentially worse,  you'll find him toddling over to his "We Must Have a Third Party" archives to recycle an old column half-prophesying/half-demanding the Resurrection of the Whig Party or Some Shit because the Left and the Right are too extreme.  A Centrist Third Party tailored to Brooks' specifications which would wipe away all tears from our eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

From 2006:

“Party No. 3”
...

There are two major parties on the ballot, but there are three major parties in America. There is the Democratic Party, the Republican Party and the McCain-Lieberman Party.
...

The McCain-Lieberman Party begins with a rejection of the Sunni-Shiite style of politics itself. It rejects those whose emotional attachment to their party is so all-consuming it becomes a form of tribalism, and who believe the only way to get American voters to respond is through aggression and stridency...

The McCain-Lieberman Party counters with constant reminders that country comes before party, that in politics a little passion energizes but unmarshaled passion corrupts, and that more people want to vote for civility than for venom...

On policy grounds, too, the McCain-Lieberman Party is distinct. On foreign policy, it agrees with Tony Blair...

On fiscal policy, the McCain-Lieberman Party ...

On globalization, the McCain-Lieberman Party believes ...

The McCain-Lieberman Party sees Democrats in the grip of teachers’ unions and Republicans who let corporations write environmental rules. It sees two parties that depend on the culture war for internal cohesion and that make abortion a litmus test.

It sees two traditions immobilized to trench warfare...

The McCain-Lieberman Party is emerging because the war with Islamic extremism...

It is emerging because of deep trends that are polarizing our politics...

It is emerging because social conservatives continue to pull the GOP rightward...

It is emerging because highly educated secular liberals are pulling the Democrats upscale and to the left...

And since both of those whopping great lies are just different aspects of Mr. Brooks' pathological Both Siderism, in between the Renaissance fairy tale and the Third Party fairy tale,  you will find, like the slime trail behind a slug,  an endless stream of Both Sides Do It extrusions for which the Sulzberger family pays Mr. Brooks handsomely. 

This week Democrats out-organized and out-voted Republicans in sufficient numbers to hold the GOP's gains to a fraction of the "Red Wave" that pundits like Mr. Brooks universally predicted would be the outcome.   And David Brooks, being David Brooks, did exactly what you would expect David Brooks to do:  shove the election results into his industrial-grade Both Siderist Fact Processor, set it to "Puree", let it run for an hour or two, and then pour our a tall glass of this glop:

If Republicans get rid of Trump, they could become the dominant party in America. If they don’t, they will decline. https://t.co/ZKxbZAaTZe

— David Brooks (@nytdavidbrooks) November 11, 2022

And what makes it so gaggingly indigestible aren't merely the lies Brooks tells, but that Brooks is such a lazy liar that, in the end, he's just fucking boring.  Such a slave to the same banal, Both Siderist template he has been using for decades that the many of us have suspected for years that his columns are produced by an algorithm knocked together by the Times' I.T. department sometime around 2005 (emphasis added):

A convulsion has shaken America and many other Western democracies over the past few years. People became disgusted with established power, trust in many institutions neared rock bottom, populist fury rose from right and left.

On the right, in America, this manifested as Donald Trump...[yadda yadda.]

The left had its own smaller version of performative populism. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez became a ... [yadda yadda.]

Performative populism has begun to ebb. Twitter doesn’t have the hold on the media class it had two years ago. Peak wokeness has passed. There seem to be fewer cancellations recently, and less intellectual intimidation...[yadda yadda.]

Then comes the inevitable erasure of Democrats qua Democrats.  When Democrats lose, it's because Democrats in Disarray!  But when Democrats win...suddenly it's some non-specific group of patriots called "voters" who have ridden to the rescue.

The single most important result of this election was the triumph of the normies. 

No, it was the triumph of the Democrats.

To be clear, I am not saying the fever has broken within the minds of those in the MAGA movement.

Then you should fire your headline writer: 

I am not saying MAGA Republicans won’t unleash a lot of looniness in the next Congress. I am saying voters have built a wall around that movement to make sure it no longer wins the power it once enjoyed.

 No, it was Democrats who did that, and fuck you for memory holing all the other times you swore to your readers that the GOP crazy was now safely back in the box.

There are two large truths I’ll leave you with. The first is that both parties are fundamentally weak. The Democrats are weak because they have become the party of the educated elite. The Republicans are weak because of Trump.

And that right there is the biggest goddamn lie of all.  The lie David "It's Gonna Be Rubio" Brooks and all virtually every other pundit has been peddling since Trump  came down the escalator.  Trump did not take over the GOP: the GOP manifested Trump.  Because the "MAGA Republicans" are not some fringe that kicked down the barn door and got loose, but can be herded back into the party and brought under control.  They are the fucking party.  

But by simply ignoring the entire history of the modern GOP up until this moment and declaring that the problem with the GOP is just this one guy -- 

The Republican weakness is easier to expunge. If Republicans get rid of Trump, they could become the dominant party in America. If they don’t, they will decline.

-- Brooks can get on with the business of selling (once again) the myth of Great Republican Renaissance that is to come.

So having done my civic duty by documenting Brooks' latest masturbartory codswallop for the benefit of future historians, now I can put my feet up and write what I want.  And today, what I want to write is

It's The Great Republican Renaissance, driftglass!

David Brooks:  [Writing] “Dear, Great Republican Renaissance, I’m looking forward to your arrival. I hope you bring me lots of presents.”

driftglass: Who are you writing to David Brooks?

David Brooks:  This is the time of year to write to the Great Republican Renaissance! Any day now, the Great Republican Renaissance rises out of its pundit patch and flies through the air with its bag of hope for all the Whigs and the Centrists!

[Yastreblyansky enters and giggles and laughs at David Brooks’ letter, David Brooks glares at him, but Yastreblyansky walks to where literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit is and is still laughing.  Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit enters the room David Brooks is in, and finds him writing to the imaginary Great Republican Renaissance.  They jump on his Twitter thread.]

Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit:  Not again! Writing a letter to an imaginary Republican Renaissance? You and Stephens and Douthat make the New York Times the laughingstock of the neighborhood. All they talk about is David Fucking Brooks who writes to the Great Republican Renaissance. You better cut it out right now or I’ll pound you. [Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit exits]

David Brooks: There are three things I learned never to listen to other people about: Religion, Politics, and the Great Republican Renaissance.  And human behavior.  And history.  And causality.  And, OK, pretty much everything.

[David Brooks continues writing, as a tiny number of David Brooks' Never Trump peers including Bill Kristol enter.]

A tiny number of David Brooks' Never Trump peers including Bill Kristol: You’re wasting your time! The Great Republican Renaissance is a fake!

David Brooks:  [Writing] “Everyone tells me you are a fake, but I believe in you. P.S. if you really are a fake, don’t tell me. I don’t wanna know.”

[One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius enters]

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius:  What are you doing?

David Brooks:  I’m writing to the Great Republican Renaissance.

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius: You say the cutest things!

David Brooks: The Great Republican Renaissance rises out of the pundit patch and flies through the air and brings hope and vindication to all the good little Whigs and Centrists everywhere! Would you like to sit with me in a pundit patch tonight and wait for the Great Republican Renaissance?

Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit: You blockhead! You've been making this same stupid prediction every few months for 20 years, and you're always wrong!

David Brooks:  Don’t talk like that! The Great Republican Renaissance knows which pundits have been good, and which pundits have been bad! You’ll be sorry!

Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit:   Jesus, this fucking guy. 

David Brooks:  It'll come here because I have the most sincere pundit patch, and it respects sincerity!

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius: Do you really think it’ll come?

David Brooks: Any day now the Great Republican Renaissance will rise out of the pundit patch, and fly through the air bringing hope and vindication to all the good little Whigs and Centrists everywhere!

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius: That’s a good story!

David Brooks:  You don’t believe in the story of the Great Republican Renaissance? I thought internet people always believed everything that was told to them.  I though internet people were innocent and trusting!

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius:  Have you met Twitter?

David Brooks:  The Great Republican Renaissance rises out of the pundit patch that it thinks is the most sincere. It's gotta be mine! It's gotta be! I don't see how a pundit patch can be more sincere than this one. You can look around and there's not a sign of self-reflection or even basic competence. Nothing but sincerity as far as the eye can see.

[Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit and even a tiny number of David Brooks' Never Trump peers including Bill Kristol walk past]

Literally everyone on the internet who is not a Beltway media pundit and even a tiny number of David Brooks' Never Trump peers including Bill Kristol:  What blockheads sitting in a pundit patch after a huge night for Democrats. 

[Everyone laughs as they leave David Brooks and one of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius in the pundit patch]

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius shouts after them:   You think you're so smart! Just wait until the Great Republican Renaissance comes. It'll be here! You can bet on that! David Brooks says what he's talking about! 

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius:  If anyone had told me I'd be waiting in a pundit patch for the Great Republican Renaissance, I'd have said they were crazy.

David Brooks:  Just think! When the Great Republican Renaissance rises out of the pundit patch, we'll be here to see him. [They read the results of the midterms, which surprises them] What's that? What's that? I hear the Great Republican Renaissance!! [John Fetterman kicks Dr. Oz's ass all the way back to New Jersey] There it is! There it is! It's Great Republican Renaissance!! It's rising out of the pundit patch.  

[David Brooks passes out from all the excitement, but the midterms just turn out to be Democrats out-organizing and outvoting Republicans] 

David Brooks begins to wake up:  What happened? Did I faint? What did the Great Republican Renaissance leave us?

[One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius waves her fists in anger, she starts shouting]

One of the very last people who still thinks David Brooks is a genius: I spent all this time waiting for the Great Republican Renaissance that you promised me, and what do I get instead? Just a bunch of  Democrats organizing and outvoting Republicans and all the usual pundits who predicted a Red Wave standing around the next day with their tiny dicks in their hands going Derp! Derp! Derp!  They all told me you were a fucking fraud, but did I listen? No. What a fool I was! They all warned me, but instead I sat here in this stupid pundit patch with a blockhead! You owe me restitution!!

David Brooks:  Hey! Aren't you gonna wait and greet the Great Republican Renaissance? Huh? It won't be long now! If the Great Republican Renaissance comes, I'll still put in a good word for you!  Good grief! I said "if"! I meant "when" it comes!! I'm doomed. One little slip like that can cause the Great Republican Renaissance to pass you by. Oh, Great Republican Renaissance, where are you?!

The next morning.

driftglass:  Well, another of your Great Republican Renaissance vigils has come and gone.

David Brooks:  Yep.

driftglass: I don't understand it. I've been warning people about toxic pundits like you for nearly 20 years, and all I got was a bag full of rocks. 

David Brooks:  Sucker.

driftglass: And once again you got paid a shit-ton of money by The New York Times to sit in a pundit patch predicting the arrival of some the Great Republican Renaissance.

David Brooks:  Yep.

driftglass: And once again the Great Republican Renaissance never showed up?

David Brooks: Nope.

driftglass: Well, don't take it too hard, David Brooks. I've done a lot of stupid things in my life, too.

[David Brooks starts laughing maniacally]

David Brooks:   Stupid?! What do you mean, stupid?! I'm a fucking genius.  Next week or the week after I'll resurrect a few Both Sides Do It pieces I wrote 15 years ago, change the names and pass them off as new and deeply sincere. And The New York Times will pay me for that.  Then, month or three from from now I'll write yet another really "sincere" column about the need for a Third Party.  A Centrist Party.  And The New York Times will pay me for that too.  I'll go on NPR and PBS and maybe Meet the Press and basically read those columns aloud, and get paid for that too.  Just wait. You’ll see.  I can recycle this crap over and over again -- selling Both Sides Do It crank and making bank -- until the end of time because there will always be high-powered, high-dollar idiots who are terrified of what's really happening in the real world.  And those mopes will go right on declaring me a genius because I tell exactly them what they want to hear.  

Just wait and see!

I Am The Liberal Media