Someone just asked me why I hate David Brooks so much

[WilliamPitt]

Brooks was the gentleman neocon who pushed the Iraq war harder and better than anyone. Speaking as the person who wrote one of the the first books saying all the proffered reasons for invasion were bullshit, Brooks has a special place in my heart as the antithesis of what needed to happen during that time.

He was among the head cheerleaders for war, and time has shown him to have been 100% wrong about everything...but oh, he writes so well, and he's so reasonable, etc etc etc.

As late as 2006 and 2007, he was getting lavish treatment from NPR and other media outlets, despite the fact that his words went a long way towards consigning millions to death and maiming, and helped hurl us down into the financial shit pit we still wallow in.

He has a nice anti-Romney article in the Times today. Whoop-de-fuckin-doo. I have a busted watch in the other room that's right twice a day.

Fuck him.

[mattclearing]

1. I said pretty much the same thing a few years ago.

Someone wanted to impress me with how open-minded and moderate they were. I disagreed with vigor.

[hifiguy]

2. Brooks is a waterhead

who is about 1/4 as smart as he thinks he is. Bad analogies, half-baked metaphors and a suffocating, all-encompassing smugness are all he brings to the table.

I loathe him with the intensity of a thousand white-hot suns.

[monmouth]

3. George Wills' love-child perhaps. I find George to be the same only more knowledgeable

about baseball than David.

[Fumesucker]

6. Will's love child with who? Peggy Noonan?

That last Brooks article definitely had a Noonanesque flavor to it..

[monmouth]

7. I'd go with that...LOL..n/t

[hifiguy]

10. I enjoyed Will's baseball books.

I cannot imagine enjoying anything that Brooks writes. The sneering condescension drips from every word he writes. Given his lack of any kind of advanced degree, his pompous pronouncements are doubly fraudulent.

[Gabi Hayes]

17. really....lame Tom Wolfe (early years) wannabe

good writer?

hack with no facks

[magical thyme]

4. he's just trying to get on the right side of history today

Romney/Ryan are toast and they know it.

He's setting up to blame Romney for the inevitable loss, instead of their shitbrain ideas.

[Chorophyll]

22. You're right. nt

[libinnyandia]

5. I have always thought his column in the Times was a waste of newsprint.

[matt819]

8. When Brooks and others like him turn on their own. . .

I have the same reaction as WP. Brooks and his ilk are the ones partly - largely? - responsible for where we are today. Their endorsements, encouragements, apologies, etc. have allowed the GOP to plunge headlong into the 13th century. We on the left - the reality-based community - and even we on the left who are not certified pundits, saw what was coming more than a decade ago. We might not have foreseen the creation of the tea party - a corporate construct in any case - but once it slithered into public view we all saw what was happening and could have predicted, in essence, what is happening now.

[ananda]

9. Brooks just came across as so smarmy..

.. whenever I saw him on tv.

He has that bespectacled boyish conservative look
that should never be trusted.

Cucker Tarlson had it too, and George Will.

Ick.

[Rob H.]

11. He's also a smug, preening ass

The only other person I can think of who's as wrong as often (or maybe even more often?) is that insufferable, smirking hack Bill Kristol.

[abq e streeter]

12. Agreed 100% on what a jackass he is, but I think it's still good

and important for those who agree with his idiotic ramblings to see him writing this. Every single solitary vote we can peel off from those on his side puts us one step closer to keeping those bastards from winning the election. So while my opinion of him is exactly the same as yours, I'm still glad to see him do this. If even one person who was gonna vote for R-Money thinks twice after reading that, then, again, I'm glad he wrote it.
Fuck that smarmy little asshole? Absolutely. But it's good to see even a few rupubliCONS turning on their own, even if just momentarily.

[AlbertCat]

13. He has a nice anti-Romney article in the Times today. Whoop-de-fuckin-doo.

Indeed.

But his article was FUNNY! I give him that.

[stupidicus]

14. that's why I despise rightwingers of the Bushbot type generally

they spent years being wrong about almost everything --as well as historically -- much of which had a strong moral component to it, e.g. lost blood and treasure in Iraq, yet they still sit on their moral high horses polishing their equally unearned (but self-granted) mensa awards.

Their immorality/amorality are showcased in their lack of remorse over the blood needlessly shed, their attitudes towards the poor and disadvantaged they try to enshrine, etc, and their lack of foresight rivalling that of the common earthworm, as well as their inability to draw the correct conclusions from the same body of fats we all share, points directly to either their complete lack of critical reasoning skills, or their service for the evil their immorality/amorality spawns.

This is why I've struggled for the last ten years in detemining what is their most defining and shameless characteristic -- their willingness to claim the moral highground as ijmmoral/amoral pucks they are, or their willingness to claim the sharpest tools in the box award as those who've been historically and currently wrong about almost every issue of significance, ranging from the efficacy and benefits of SS, to that of the most important issue of this or any other time, AGW.

This is also why I've long thought civility is way overrated. There is no getting over, around, or under their mountain of denials, there's just going through it/running them over. While their complete abandonment of the 9th Commandment has pretty much eliminated whatever attitude/behavioral modification value shame use to have in this country, at least running them over provides us an outlet for our frustrations, and helps keep the emperor naked, whether they find that condition embarassing or not.

What you wrote about is in my estimation, the best evidence for the myth of a "liberal" media. It's not just that he still has a soapbox, but also that those that got most of it right, don't.

[JNelson6563]

15. I agree completely.

All too often if someone says something we agree with, some are ready to declare them a hero and perhaps should run in '16.

It's the exact behavior we so often see scorned here so you have to love the irony.

Julie

[NRaleighLiberal]

16. couldn't agree more. Well said...I like it when Shields mops the floor with him on NewsHour

[samsingh]

18. i agree with you and can't stand this idiot.

[skepticscott]

19. It seems that in this blog-filled age

it is far more important to be a slick and wordy writer than an insightful thinker, and to make some pretense to being a moderate. Andrew Sullivan is another prime example of this type. A guy who's been wrong about almost everything that matters until it was way too late, but who still gets undeserved attention because he seems so "reasonable" and is such a nice writer.

[bupkus]

20. Brooks is a fraud

Despite his complete lack of intellectual integrity.

[Chorophyll]

21. Brooks is a weasel whose conservatism moves like a snake through the

bland suburban lawn of his writing style. When he isn't war-mongering, he's being a prig about how liberals raise their children. One anti-Romney article ain't gonna wipe out his history of slime.

ETA: having just read Brooks' column (belatedly) I have to say: It's not anti-Romney in the least. He's making fun of Romney's lousy campaign style, and he does it well. But check out the final paragraph (emphasis mine):

After his governorship, Romney suffered through a midlife crisis, during which he became a social conservative. This prepared the way for his presidential run. He barely won the 2012 Republican primaries after a grueling nine-month campaign, running unopposed. At the convention, where his Secret Service nickname is Mannequin, Romney will talk about his real-life record: successful business leader, superb family man, effective governor, devoted community leader and prudent decision-maker. If elected, he promises to bring all Americans together and make them feel inferior.

Oh Brooksy, so clever.

[grantcart]

23. I call him "6 months Brooks"

Every fucking appearance he would say "well if we just give it 6 more months we will see the situation get better and the two sides open significant lines of communication".

Every time it was another 6 months.

David Gergen is another. You can see articles like this every once in a while where the come out on the right side and get a little intellectual cover.

They then take that cover to help destroy the country a little.

If Gergen and Brooks would stand up and say that it is unconsciouble that the US doesn't affirm the right for medical care without regard to the ability to pay, we would have universal health care. Seriously if these two made a joint statement on the simple morality of it the discussion would be over.

They always remind of the guys who were trying to patch together some 'reasonable' compromise to keep slavery before the civil war.

Now having said that, it was a fucking funny article that Brooks wrote, it just shows how smart he COULD be and how much he throws out the window.

I also wonder if these guys aren't watching HBO. All of a sudden Matthews/Williams/Brooks are taking courageous stands.

News Room may be one of those rare moments, like Roots, where it actually impacts on political culture.