David Brooks and the Real President
posted at 1:26 pm on January 19, 2010 by Slublog
I suppose we should be grateful he’s not admiring pants creases. Still, amazing that a guy who prides himself on being smarter than you can write something so breathtakingly false. Behold the power of Obama Beer Goggles:
In many ways, Barack Obama has lived up to his promise. He has created a thoughtful, pragmatic administration marked by a culture of honest and vigorous debate. When Obama makes a decision, you can be sure that he has heard and accounted for every opposing argument. If he senses an important viewpoint is not represented at a meeting, he will stop the proceedings and demand that it gets included.If the evidence leads him in directions he finds uncomfortable, he will still follow the evidence. He is beholden to no ideological camp, and there is no group in his political base that he has not angered at some point in his first year.
Really, David? Really?
Three days after taking office, Obama’s response to Republicans who disagreed with the economic stimulus plan was “I won.” Obama had been president less than a month when in February he openly mocked Republicans during a speech to the Democratic caucus.
In April, he told a group of bankers that he was the “only thing between you and the pitchforks.”
In May, Obama threatened to sic the White House press corps on Chrysler bondholders who disagreed with his plan to bail out GM.
In August, Obama said he did not want “the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking,” preferring them to “just to get out of the way so we can clean up the mess.”
In September, John Boehner revealed that Obama had not invited GOP leaders to the White House for meetings on healthcare reform since April.
In October, the White House declared war on Fox News and tried to encourage other news organizations to alienate them.
Earlier this month, after both houses of Congress passed different healthcare bills, Obama agreed to a plan that would allow Democratic leaders to sidestep conference committee to once again shut the GOP out of the process. This, despite his oft-repeated promise on the campaign trail to make the debate open and on C-SPAN.
Yesterday, Politico reported that Obama plans to take a “combative” turn to fight for healthcare if Scott Brown wins today’s election in Massachusetts.
I’m sure there are other examples, but these stories do not paint a picture of a president interested in “honest and vigorous” debate, and the arguments of those who may disagree with him. His actions on healthcare alone suggest not one who puts evidence-based pragmatism ahead of ideology. It’s time for Brooks to bury his Fantasy Obama and face reality – he was suckered.
Blowback
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Don’t bother David with evidence; he’s too busy concentrating on the pants crease.
irishspy on January 19, 2010 at 1:37 PM
Great post and list! I dont see Brooks ever taking off that ole blindfold.
becki51758 on January 19, 2010 at 1:39 PM
The quoted section from Brooks’s article is amazingly and breathtakingly foolish. Not even Brooks could possibly believe that. I think he is living out the “gamblers ruin” scenario in commentary form — even knowing everything he is writing is a huge pile of BS, he can’t or won’t admit how spectacularly wrong he was all the time, so he keeps doubling down, figuring the dice have to fall his way the next time.
jwolf on January 19, 2010 at 2:06 PM
Buckley said it best:
“I won’t insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.”
Brooks isn’t stupid, and he’s not mentally ill – he’s simply astonishingly dishonest.
Midas on January 19, 2010 at 2:13 PM
Brooks, time to double up on those kneepads.
GnuBreed on January 19, 2010 at 2:22 PM
David, get a room willya? And wipe that…stuff…off your chin.
BradSchwartze on January 19, 2010 at 2:23 PM
David Brooks, I quit doing drugs in the 1990s. You might want to consider the same.
rbj on January 19, 2010 at 2:28 PM
When did he start writing for “The Onion”? This is one of the funniest political satire pieces I have ever read!
notanobot on January 19, 2010 at 2:28 PM
Does Brooks really come up with this stuff on his own or is he just repeating what someone whispers into his ear?
Skandia Recluse on January 19, 2010 at 3:36 PM
Incredible. What do you in response to this, or rather to the idea of an intelligent person being able to say this outside a purely political partisan context? It is sad and laughable. I remember reading an essay by Brooks years ago about suburban subculture. It was quite good. What happened to him?
rrpjr on January 19, 2010 at 5:07 PM
Brooks knows he’s been pilloried on the right for being duped by Obama, which to an intellectual like David calls his very self-worth into question if he’s not as smart as Sarah Palin. So he holds out hope and fantasies that it’s not Obama that’s caused this problem, it’s the leaders in Congress who steered Obama down the road to ruin.
What’s just as funny/sad is how Brooks starts out his last paragraph:
…which assumes that Obama’s governmental vision after hanging around nobody but people of the left for vitrually his entire life is fundamentally different from Nancy Pelosi’s. What’s different is Obama hates conflict where he has to play the bad cop, and while he’d love to see his political enemies on the right destroyed and is certainly willing to attack them, he’s not going to get his hands dirty doing it, especially if that means also having to crush the Blue Dogs who balk at his ideas out of fear of losing their own jobs in November.
Brooks’ predacessor at the Times, William Safire, was at least man enough to admit by early 1994 that he had been snookered by Bill Clinton and voted for him under false pretenses in 1992. David still fears having to eat crow for Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck and wants to believe if you just give Barack a little more time and a few new congressional leaders by 2011, he’ll at least try to triangulate just like Clinton did after the ’94 debacle.
jon1979 on January 19, 2010 at 5:08 PM
Even MORE wishful thinking on mushrooms!
singlemalt_18 on January 19, 2010 at 6:21 PM
It’s time for Brooks to bury his Fantasy Obama and face reality – he was suckered.
And I thought it was the reverse!
chickasaw42 on January 19, 2010 at 6:33 PM
Barry’s got other problems now. HE’S A LAME-DUCK!
GarandFan on January 19, 2010 at 9:57 PM
Brooks is Di-loos-sional!!
rebuzz on January 19, 2010 at 9:58 PM
Brooks is a puke.
royzer on January 19, 2010 at 10:01 PM
There’s a David Brooks born every minute..
ronsfi on January 19, 2010 at 10:04 PM
He’s a sycophantic fag, hoping for an opportunity to iron a nice crease in Obama’s pants.
lionheart on January 19, 2010 at 10:05 PM
Great call, Slu. Brooks is living in a dream world, unless he somehow believes that O’Bonehead carefully and pragmatically weighs every decision, and always determines that the socialist viewpoint is the most convincing.
What a twit.
Jaibones on January 19, 2010 at 10:07 PM
I read this earlier today and had to go back and read it again to confirm what I thought I had read the first time. It reads to me like a high school essay on citizenship or something. Brooks has to be bought and paid for to be able to write this disingenuously. However, look at his readers. I scanned through the 300 or so comments and 9 out of 10 either supported Brooks analysis or accused him of being too critical of Obama. NYT and their readers will go down with the ship.
polmom on January 19, 2010 at 10:07 PM
WHO, said David Brooks was an intellectual?
Is that something he keeps telling and people just believe it?
If he’s an intellectual, I’m a f’n GENIUS!
belad on January 19, 2010 at 10:19 PM
Davey “Plankton” Brooks: “I went to college!” I have a BA in History. I am “educated,” you’re not.
Biggest patsy in what’s left of print media, is David Brooks.
james23 on January 19, 2010 at 10:28 PM
But…but..but, Brooks wants to be invited to all the right parties in DC!
JeffB. on January 19, 2010 at 11:02 PM
David Brooks – endangered feces.
Why do we even read his crap any more? Back when he was claiming to have been fondled by a Republican senator he had some entertainment value, but now even that’s gone and he’s just a waste of time. I think Hot Air provides half his readership by linking to him.
Let him wither.
Steven on January 19, 2010 at 11:07 PM
David Brooks doesn’t believe in the the rhetoric he feeds his readers but he wants you and I to believe that he’s a down to earth guy that wants the same things as we do. To his followers, he’s an intellectual but to his detractors, he’s a pure twit through and through.
As I’ve always said, a piece of paper isn’t an education, on the contrary an education is what you can take with you to apply during your life.
larvcom on January 19, 2010 at 11:18 PM
“Only an intellectual could believe such nonsense. No ordinary man could be such a fool.” – George Orwell
packsoldier on January 19, 2010 at 11:21 PM
Brooks is a RINO Tool that I refer to as an Ignoramus with Literary skills.
Punditpawn on January 19, 2010 at 11:30 PM
Hmmmm….Brooks is still an out-of-touch ivory tower legend in his little mind nerd with homo tendencies.
Move on.
Sapwolf on January 20, 2010 at 12:02 AM
Great quote.
Sapwolf on January 20, 2010 at 12:03 AM
Barry Hussein Obama has lived up to all the expectations of a national socialist marxist maoist mohammedian thug dictator.
Which is why the electorate is making him a lame duck, every time a statewide election gives them the chance…
wildcat84 on January 20, 2010 at 12:09 AM
Would love to see a video of Brooks’ quote and each of Obama’s speeches refuting the premise.
fred5678 on January 20, 2010 at 12:16 AM
I think David got an up close and personal view of the pant zipper.
johnnybgood on January 20, 2010 at 12:33 AM
Someday, someone will do a decently scholarly piece on why these buffoons who fantasize themselves to be ‘public intellectuals’ were so uniformly suckered by the Golden Calf.
One is inclined to think that these people have never met a really good salesman.
JEM on January 20, 2010 at 12:35 AM
Neosporin for the knees, Chapstick for the lips, and Listerine for the breath.
jukin on January 20, 2010 at 1:00 AM
The easiest people to fool or get to buy something they do not need, are the ones that think they are smart. An actual quote from my father the car salesman.
jukin on January 20, 2010 at 1:02 AM
There is no correlation between presiding thoughtfully at policy discussions and governing a country effectively. At some point a leader in a democracy has to prioritize initiatives and work the room, so to speak, to get them passed and popularly accepted. And do so skillfully, persistently and with credibility. Obama has never functioned in a genuinely pluralistic environment. He has never had to “sell” a determinedly hostile audience on a controversial proposal. He knows how to preach to a shrinking choir. I don’t know how boxed in he is ideologically but it doesn’t really matter because he can’t seem to break out of his comfort zone even if he detaches himself intellectually. That’s a perfectly human attitude from a comparatively cerebral politician but it is hopelessly inadequate to the situation an angry, unruly and polarized country finds itself in. And Brooks does him no favors by playing to his vanity.
Seth Halpern on January 20, 2010 at 1:22 AM
I used to read Brooks on occasion, but now he’s just one of the many background voices chanting in the temple of liberal worship. These people enjoy listening to themselves more than anything else in life.
ClanDerson on January 20, 2010 at 1:26 AM
Who’s David Brooks? Is he one of those guys who makes suits?
AV8R on January 20, 2010 at 1:29 AM
Why don’t we give him the Walter Duranty Award for Objectivity and Accuracy in reporting?
DoctorJohn on January 20, 2010 at 7:56 AM
By this he means that the left is having a vigorous debate with the far left. No other voices are permitted in the debate.
Of course to liberals, no other voices exist.
MarkTheGreat on January 20, 2010 at 8:11 AM
David Brooks did. And so far the number of people who believe it is 1.
MarkTheGreat on January 20, 2010 at 8:13 AM
This guy is living in the universe of lies. Did they put his column on the funnies page?
Kissmygrits on January 20, 2010 at 8:50 AM
Thank you for confirmation!
belad on January 20, 2010 at 9:23 AM
Sheesh! Brooks exemplifies the typical, elitist, out-of-touch moron that populates Washington (both sides of the aisle). Hard to fathom that level of ignorance.
ultracon on January 20, 2010 at 9:42 AM
I’m glad someone fisked Brooks over that amazing column. Even when he sides with conservatives he enters and leaves via the back door.
I think he’s well on his way to being Andrew Sullivan.
rcl on January 20, 2010 at 11:55 AM
David Brooks does not inhabit the same universe as I.
PoodleSkirt on January 20, 2010 at 5:58 PM
Brooks is just another tragic boob who’s training bra was never properly adjusted.
GT on January 20, 2010 at 6:47 PM