David Brooks Is Sad That Obama Didn't Buy Him A Pony

David Brooks, man without a political party, is embittered today that President Barack Obama didn't create a political party for him. I have to admit, the party that David Brooks seems to want sure sounds like a wonder! It will declare the end of politics as usual, and stoke positivity, and popularity will trump populism, and -- I suppose through the sheer force of its goodness! -- quash all other political interest-seekers of their interest seeking. Life will be one long campfire song. But Obama now wants to pass the "Buffett rule," and so the dream of a country for self-described "saps" is dead. What is a self-described "sap" doing writing about politics, anyway? That seems to demonstrate that Brooks is a glutton for disappointment.

Today, Brooks writes:

When the president said the unemployed couldn't wait 14 more months for help and we had to do something right away, I believed him. When administration officials called around saying that the possibility of a double-dip recession was horrifyingly real and that it would be irresponsible not to come up with a package that could pass right away, I believed them.

Why did David Brooks need Barack Obama to tell him that the unemployed couldn't wait 14 more months for help? Does he not know that there's a rampant unemployment crisis in America? Had he found this out on his own instead of waiting many, many years for Obama to give a speech, he might have used his influence to push Obama into doing something about the unemployed many years ago, thus avoiding the problem he identifies in his next paragraph.

I liked Obama's payroll tax cut ideas and urged Republicans to play along. But of course I'm a sap. When the president unveiled the second half of his stimulus it became clear that this package has nothing to do with helping people right away or averting a double dip. This is a campaign marker, not a jobs bill.

Emphasis mine. For the record, Brooks is absloutely right. The American Jobs Act is absolutely about having something to say -- if not do -- about the key issue of the 2012 race. There is now an "Obama Jobs Plan" to go along with the "Perry Jobs Plan" and the "Romney Jobs Plan." The American Jobs Act has no chance of being enacted into law (neither does any bill that would raise taxes on the wealthiest 1%) and Obama knows this. Everyone knows this. Let's definitely get cynical! But let's also try to remember that a big reason it won't pass has to do with another "campaign marker," thrown down long ago:

"The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president."

-- Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

Brooks says that he supported the payroll tax cut and "urged Republicans to play along." They didn't. And this is Obama's fault? Is Brooks withering away wondering what it was that Obama personally did to sour the GOP on making a tax cut? Read Mitch McConnell's quote: what Obama did was "exist" and "become President."

So now, Brooks is upset that Obama, "in his remarks Monday ... didn't try to win Republicans to even some parts of his measures." But he went to great lengths to do just that in presenting the American Jobs Act ... which Brooks now calls a "campaign marker" ... because it won't pass Congress ... because the GOP is lockstep against it ... which ... kind of makes trying to win over Republicans pointless.

Meanwhile, Brooks is similarly aggrieved that Obama "repeated the populist cries that fire up liberals but are designed to enrage moderates and conservatives."

Let's take a measure of this rage, shall we? In a SurveyUSA poll conducted on August 31, respondents -- by an 82% to 5% margin -- said that raising taxes on the richest Americans and closing corporate tax loopholes would make them more likely to vote to re-elect Obama (11% said it would make no difference). Within the cohort of independent voters, support for these policies was 79% to 10%.

This is nothing new. Back in June of 2010, America Speaks (a Peter G. Peterson joint) conducted a series of nationwide focus groups and found that people "overwhelmingly supported proposals" that included, among other things, the raising of "tax rates on corporate income and those earning more than $1 million."

So, go right ahead and call this a "campaign marker," if you like. But let's not kid ourselves into thinking that these proposals "enrage moderates." They don't! (They enrage conservatives, sure, but conservatives are enraged that the president, like many presidents that both preceded him and will follow him, did things like raise the debt ceiling and use a teleprompter.)

Brooks keeps calling himself a sap. And he keeps testifying to the fact that he always thinks Obama is going to do certain things, like propose reforms, but "each time he gets close, he rips the football away." Yes, Obama fought for a center-right health care reform package that imitated the one Mitt Romney instituted in Massachusetts and ran for president in 2008 on the premise that it would be a model for the nation. The GOP rejected it. During the debt-ceiling crisis, Obama offered John Boehner a package that included $4 trillion in spending cuts, $1 trillion in revenues, and a change in the Medicare eligibility age. Boehner rejected it.

Obama is not the Lucy Van Pelt in these scenarios. Is Brooks not up on current events? Does he not pay attention to the politics? My working theory is that Brooks decides that he "thinks" Obama is poised to do something he likes. Then he blisses out for several months, and when he comes out of his reverie, he sees that nothing's been done and gets upset that Obama hasn't changed politics wholesale through the sheer force of his personality. I know that seems implausible! I'm just trying to get my head around how Brooks could have possibly arrived at these conclusions.

Brooks writes: "To be an Obama admirer is to toggle from being uplifted to feeling used." On that sentiment, there are many, many Obama supporters who feel the same way. But you know why they feel used? Because Obama keeps going back to the GOP, seeking to bring them into the policymaking fold, long after it has become apparent that they have no intention of playing a part in the enactment of almost anything. What prevents them from being "uplifted" is that by trying and failing to play the compromise game, Obama fails to exert a gravitational pull on the rightward drift of what's considered "mainstream," leading to the elevation of extremes that I am led to believe Brooks nominally opposes.

What makes them "feel used" is that Obama keeps trying and trying and trying to be the President that David Brooks wants him to be. Well, it hasn't worked out, and like it or not, I don't imagine that "making David Brooks feel good" is the hill that the Obama administration wants to die on, however honorable a death Brooks thinks it is.

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Comments

[Llib Noswad]

01:08 PM on 11/18/2011

"Obama fails to exert a gravitational pull on the rightward drift of what's considered "mainstream".

Gravitational pull? obama has no nor will he have any gravitational pull on the Americans in this country. obama offer zip, zero, zilch when it comes to get this country back on track.

[zogimperator]

11:14 AM on 09/22/2011

David Brooks, like his colleague Thomas Friedman, is only considered relevant because of his extraordinary platform (the New York Times). He has nothing much to say, and has been phoning his material in for decades. Friedman is at least such an awful writer he's fun to read sometimes; Brooks, on the other hand, writes like a Pottery Barn catalog.
He has one point, repeated forever: 'not all conservatives are crazy. Some of them are awesome, like I am. Be quiet and listen to me.'

[greezil428]

09:35 PM on 09/21/2011

So this is what it comes to petty fundamentalism...tsk tsk The fall of a once great country started with the same attitude that fell the old powers 'ME'.

[Tidyus]

05:10 PM on 09/21/2011

Wake up, David.

[pbr56]

02:37 PM on 09/21/2011

That is exactly what I was thinking when I read Brooks' piece.

[Ten Percent Off]

01:50 PM on 09/21/2011

How can any clear-thinking individual blame Republicans--or the Loch Ness monster for that matter--for obstructing legislation when President Obama enjoyed a Democrat-controlled congress for his first two years? Reid and Pelosi equaled the congressional equivalent of a blank check. Assuming that Democrats do not blindly vote for anything of Democrat origin, the only impediment that existed was a bill's own merit. Remember the debt ceiling debate? I don't understand--if failure to raise the debt ceiling was not just unthinkable, but "Armaggedon", as the President himself characterized, why did he wait until Republicans controlled the House to do anything about it? As the President has told us many times, using hyperbole and scare tactics is unacceptable, therefore we assume that he honestly felt that a failure to raise the debt ceiling was America's doom. Do you really have a rational answer for why he did nothing about it for two years, until Republicans gained control of the House?

Many people posting here have clearly allowed political and media-borne lies and manipulation to drive them to the point of actual blindness to reason. This is way beyond natural human bias and an outright rejection of facts that conflict with one's emotions and worldview. I'm probably an idiot for not giving up on people in general, but the day one stops listening to Republican and Democrat garbage and starts questioning what he is told and starts vigilantly seeking truth is the day one becomes an adult.

[pbr56]

02:48 PM on 09/21/2011

Apparently you haven't paid attention. When the house was under democratic control, they had no problem passing legislation. The problem, howerver, is that it had to go through the senate. Republicans have twisted the rules there and used a procedure that was only used rarely to stop every bill possible. The democrats only had 60 members for a short time. A delay for Franken taking office and special elections kept changing the numbers. Unlike republicans, democrats are more likely to think for themselves. Unfortunately, some of these democrats are ones like Ben Nelson who thinks it is ok to hijack the process, not unlike republicans, in order to extort some measures that he thinks will benefit his reelection. I do agree with one thing you said though.

[Ten Percent Off]

07:20 PM on 09/21/2011

Thank you for responding to my post. But you didn't address the point I chose to make...that President Obama did not even bring up the issue of the looming Armaggedon until more than two years after taking office...when Republicans then controlled the house. Let me clarify so that we don't talk at cross purposes--there is, by definition, nothing worse than Armaggedon. No legislation has a higher priority than legislation that averts Armaggedon. You don't want to disagree with that, do you?

Here's an interesting fact that shouldn't have surprised me when I discovered it: every single time in recent history that a president, Democrat or Republican has asked to raise the debt ceiling, his party voted for it, and the opposing party voted against it. Dems and Repubs voting their consciences, huh?

President Obama gave no attention to the financial Armaggedon of our country for two long years, until the last minute. You know in your head and heart that I have only put forth facts. How does one excuse this?

[Israel4Ever]

06:07 PM on 11/18/2011

The political class had a very difficult time envisioning that the republicans would become financial suicide bombers and threaten to take everyone in the country with them if they did not get their way. If, after a decade of peaceful and essentially de riguer rubber stamping of the debt ceiling extension, the president and his congress did not anticipate the vitriolic stupidity and clutching cupidity of their opposition, I believe they can be forgiven. Now, if they do it again, then it is on democratic heads. Fool my once...duh...we won't get fooled again.

As for blindly voting for anything of their origin, who do you think you are fooling. The Republicans have held back every jot and tittle of legislation not originated in their no-think tanks, using procedural gimmickry to overrule the wishes of the electorate. You see, the people did not elect 40% of them to make the rules...

Scare tactics are saying there is a monster under the bed...you see, because there really is no such things as monsters. It is not scare tacticts to ring the tsunami emergency bell when there is a tidal wave on the way. Again, you are so used to talking into the mirror you have forgotten that others can easily see through your tissue of conceit...it is too thin to call it deceit.

[Binea]

11:03 AM on 09/21/2011

no one else will tell us What Ron Paul say's on these issues..news certainly didn't did they ?
so forgive me if I posted something some one else did,I believe my Guy,is right,and I'd like others to consider what he say's,and decide for themselves.It's not always black and white,like they say. It's not always the estab dem or estab repub way..there are other ways..but they play their games at OUR expense. so ,sorry if someone else posted what I did

[pbr56]

02:50 PM on 09/21/2011

That is the problem with Ron Paul. He thinks everything is Black and White. Way too ridgid in his allegiance to a flawed belief system.

[Binea]

02:59 PM on 09/21/2011

LOL he is the LEAST rigid of any in any party..he's a conservative libertarian ( very much for personal VS group rights) and very much a constitutionalist ( having OCD with the constitution IS A GOOD Thing ) It means he won't try to write an executive order to say,ban gay marriage,or abortion or get rid of SS or Medicare or civil rights..get it ?

[Binea]

03:05 PM on 09/21/2011

What I have come to understand,is that each side tries to force it's "philosophy" of life,be that christianity or atheism or pro life pro choice..pro gay marraige against gay marraige..each side wants to FORCE their will by having the supreme court decide for ALL one way or another..Ron paul say's in most things it should be left to the states to decide..and if you really think hard about it..it is the ONLY safe bet and FAIR way to deal with those things..both sides get their way in some places.
If you are FOR gay marraige..and you get it to the supreme court,and the court decides you HAVE NO RIGHT to marry..you lose everywhere..if left to the states..as society learns that it is not going to be Sodom and Gamorrah so to speak, that gays are just like everyone else..more states will allow it.
So Paul is very wise,in my opinion

[Joseph Schmoe]

10:42 AM on 09/21/2011

David Brooks wants so badly to be one of the popular kids, and he's proven himself willing to say or do or write anything they ask him to.
Pity. Once in a while he actually makes a little bit of sense. But then he always issues the mea culpa when his superiors slap him back in his place.
He's pathetic to read; worse to watch.

[Evan Pritchard]

10:31 AM on 09/21/2011

Oh my God...I don't even know where to begin.

Are you just mad about Brooks criticizing Obama? Or that he is expressing frustration and disappointment with the increasingly partisan system (which you, here, apparently endorse?). You conflate 'moderates and conservatives' with the GOP, when in reality there seem to be a fair number of the former looking for a place to go now that the GOP has - officially - gone completely batsh*t insane. Brooks, as a moderate, seems to have been hoping that Obama would provide such a space and is disappointed by Obama seeming to be sounding out previously unsuccessful ideas in an effort to rally enthusiasm from the left (as you emphasized, a focus on the election rather than the issue at hand). What point, exactly, are you trying to make here?

PS the pony thing was a bit puerile, don't you think?

[pbr56]

02:52 PM on 09/21/2011

If Brooks is disappointed in Obama, then what must he think of his own party. Wouldn't that be a better place for him to concentrate then with someone that he seems to agree with more often then not.

[Evan Pritchard]

02:59 PM on 09/21/2011

I think he has been, actually. I remember during the '08 campaign he was extremely critical of Palin and of McCain for choosing her, and he's been openly opposed to excessive government reduction and radically conservative social policies. Not to mention the whole supporting the Obama administration thing.

[Tidyus]

05:19 PM on 09/21/2011

Brooks thinks he is being an exciting writer by stating his case in this manner. It is not authentic but it is his usual spiel.

[Russ Klettke]

09:57 AM on 09/21/2011

Thank you Jason Linkins. Finally someone states the obvious. I wish more media could call out Republicans for parroting the Frank Luntz talking points that are pure, unadulterated Orwellianism (Jon Stewart is the exception).

Although, I do enjoy talking to rightwingers when they'll use a phrase like "class warfare" or "Obamacare" or "support the troops" or "I'm a fiscal conservative" or others of the Luntz-Limbaugh meme lexicon. Ask them three questions that would allow them to support their words and almost all get tongue-tied in trying to formulate an answer. They simply are repeating phrases that allow them to retreat from facts. As progressives, if we know our stuff we have the opportunity to take the conversation back to reality.

[Daniel Hough Jones]

10:10 AM on 09/21/2011

Dear Russ,

Thank you for mentioning Frank Luntz. I couldn't remember his name. His kind of word manipulation is bringing about the collapse of our society.

There is, however, a solution. See "Reform Society - Save Ourselves," at -

http://americanconversationgroup.blogspot.com/p/key-essay.html

Best wishes,
Daniel Hough Jones

[Russ Klettke]

01:04 PM on 09/21/2011

Very interesting, Dan. I'm looking at your blog now and will try to respond a bit later (after I finish some client work due today).

[Binea]

09:47 AM on 09/21/2011

oops that was his campaign issuing a statement

[Binea]

09:45 AM on 09/21/2011

Ron Paul -

"A $1.5 trillion tax hike will do nothing to help us out of this mess we're in, and will more than likely create more problems, lead to less investment, and cause more job loss at a time when Americans of all kinds are hurting.

"President Obama and his administration refuse to confront the realities of our situation and the actions that are necessary. We must reduce spending, instead they pretend that the budget can be balanced and prosperity restored by increasing spending and taxes.

"Instead of raising taxes, this administration should cut corporate welfare, foreign welfare and end the trillion dollars overseas wars by bringing troops home."

"These would be sound policy actions, the kind that create prosperity and engender greater freedom. These are the kind of policies that a President Ron Paul will advocate for and institute to restore limited government principles and a strong America."

[Binea]

09:18 AM on 09/21/2011

This guy is right..Obama is playing election time games,he put things into a bill ,that he knows repubs will never pass.Then say's he will pass parts of it.Most likely the parts that get passed,will be everything Liberals don't WANT passed,and everything repubs DO want passed.OR nothing will get done,and the president can go on the trail,telling us how Repubs hate the poor.
Both parties ignore even considering ..closing down some un needed bases around the world..we have 900 of them ? There is no talk of really ending the wars ( they will continue through the whole mideast)
Tired of the games..and yes 14 MONTHS is a long time to wait for anything to start to get better

[Daniel Hough Jones]

09:53 AM on 09/21/2011

Dear Binea,

Correct. The system is broken. We need the Kirkwood Amendment. Admittedly, it is a long-term solution and does not preclude attempting other things in the short term. See "Reform Society - Save Ourselves" at -

http://americanconversationgroup.blogspot.com/p/key-essay.html

Best wishes,
Daniel Hough Jones

[Binea]

11:05 AM on 09/21/2011

ok, I'll go look at it

[Binea]

11:06 AM on 09/21/2011

sorry I gave you the lol badge lol..meant to give you the smart one

[pbr56]

02:57 PM on 09/21/2011

The election games are being played by republicans. When Obama said that all the policies he was proposing had republican support in the past, he wasn't lying. What would you like Obama to propose? killing medicare, or Social security. Short of those, I doubt republicans will support anything he proposes.

[lawyerfan]

03:28 PM on 09/21/2011

If Obama proposed to end Medicare altogether, the republicans would be opposed because they would be afraid that Obama would get the "credit" for doing it. The only way to make any sense out of the republican position on every major issue in the past three years is to return to Mitch McConnell's statement about making Obama a one term president.

[Binea]

04:32 PM on 09/21/2011

If the GOP really wanted to destroy him,they'd let the bill pass ( IF they truely believe it was bad) that's where I find a flaw in his ( Obama's thinking) Though I am SURE ( because the man said so,that MitchMcduck..does want to destroy him)
something is not adding up here.
What I'd like Obama to do,is listen to the only honest repub there,Ron Paul,and take HIS advice..but he won't..because the nutcases spreading the new world order conspiracy theories, are beginning to look sane and right.
I think Obama believes in "manifest destiny" on a worldwide scale..with a slight twist,the dem twist.
But, if that is true..he should rethink it,cause a centralized world gov can easily be taken over by any stalin wannabe with money and a brain.
Please do convince me I'm wrong..cause..I'm scared
show me where I am wrong..and I will admit I'm wrong

[Carl Caroli]

09:07 AM on 09/21/2011

"Why did David Brooks need Barack Obama to tell him that the unemployed couldn't wait 14 more months for help? "
Brooks and most pundits and politicians are so out of touch with the average working class family it's sad. The pathetic part is that they are so smug about it. They are comfortable and don't see or want to see reality, since reality hurts and may prove all their grandiose flapping of the lips wrong. I wish the MSM would find real people to comment on events, not these phonies. That's half the problem in this country - the MSM tells it as it wants it to be, not how it is. All of them.

[Daniel Hough Jones]

10:05 AM on 09/21/2011

Dear Carl,

I am new at this. I take it "MSM" stands for the mass media. Well, I agree with you. You put it well > "Out of touch," "smug," "comfortable," "reality hurts," "flapping of the lips," and so on. These are pointed words that people in general can understand.

The problem, as I see it, is that the MSM - and really, all of us to some degree - manipulate words for our own benefit. I call it "Influtrol." We want to appear as though we are merely trying to influence our audience, but really we want to control them.

See, "Reform Society - Save Ourselves" at -

http://americanconversationgroup.blogspot.com/p/key-essay.html

Best wishes,
Daniel Hough Jones

[Carl Caroli]

03:56 PM on 09/21/2011

Main Stream Media, is what it stands for, but you got the drift. And it's a two fold problem - yes, the network owners are trying to influence their audience. Each network clearly has it's own agenda, but pretty much all these experts and pundits make an order of magnitude (x10) or more than the average working class person, so they don't have the same level of anxiety over things. A dime increase in gasoline is an annoyance at best, something to complain about, while for the working man it can take food of the table. There have got to be plenty of well educated people in economics making far less that can better understand and discuss the frustration of the working class. As a former electrical engineer with bell labs, I can tell you I know many brilliant engineers and mid-level managers whose opinion and perspective I value a whole lot more than than the executive directors and V.P.s we worked for. Most of them were blowing smoke, and we all knew it. And sadly, bell labs, a former bastion of high tech development and national brain trust, isn't even an American company anymore. Which kind of proves the point, at least to me.

[sposton]

08:58 AM on 09/21/2011

All actors play their assigned roles but we the people forget that we aren't looking at a functioning government working on our behalf but an elaborate theatrical production - a charade. The purpose of this theater is to herd people into their respective camps based on their political affinities. We must do this willingly and while asleep. We aren't supposed to see the thieving structure behind it all. This provides the thieving system a thin veneer of legitimacy that it does not deserve. We provide the necessary consent to our destruction - how nifty!

Republicans are evil and Democrats are good, or vice versa, based your own specific political beliefs. How has this been working for us? Ah, but to answer this would require a capacity for historical reflection which has been lost with the emergence of the 15 second attention span. ;-)

Keep on believing Americans! Be optimistic and everything will work itself out just fine, NOT! If only we re-elect Obama, or if we only elect Perry and all will be OK. How pathetic!