David Brooks, "When Beauty Strikes": From "Pagan Brutalism" to Artsy-Fartsy

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David Brooks is indeed a renaissance man.

On the heels of his prior New York Times op-ed entitled "The Brutalism of Ted Cruz" in which Brooks savaged what he termed Cruz's "pagan brutalism," he now, in a 180 degree turnaround, brings us "When Beauty Strikes." Brooks informs us in his new Times opinion piece:

"If true racial reconciliation is achieved in this country, it will be through the kind of deep spiritual and emotional understanding that art can foster. You change the world by changing peoples’ hearts and imaginations."

Fascinating! Racial reconciliation by way of art! A pity it wasn't the focus of President Obama's State of the Union Address.

All of which reminds me of W.C. Fields' thoughts regarding aesthetics:

"I was in love with a beautiful blonde once, dear. She drove me to drink. That's the one thing I'm so indebted to her for."

Sorry, what's that you said, darling? No, of course the Fields quotation has nothing to do with you. Simply decided to break away from my bounded rationality and go with the flow of universal creativity. You know, change my heart and imagination.

That's all.

David Brooks, "The Art of Focus": Hocus-Pocus

"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull."

- W.C. Fields

A couple of years ago, in a New Yorker article entitled "The Obama Memos" (http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/01/30/120130fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all), Ryan Lizza wrote :

"On a frigid January evening in 2009, a week before his Inauguration, Barack Obama had dinner at the home of George Will, the Washington Post columnist, who had assembled a number of right-leaning journalists to meet the President-elect. Accepting such an invitation was a gesture on Obama’s part that signalled his desire to project an image of himself as a post-ideological politician, a Chicago Democrat eager to forge alliances with conservative Republicans on Capitol Hill. That week, Obama was still working on an Inaugural Address that would call for 'an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics.'"

Ah yes, "an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn-out dogmas that for far too long have strangled our politics." Five years later, where did that take us? Among those attending the dinner was Richard Lowry, editor of the National Review, who, as noted by Lizza, "grabbed Obama’s hand and said softly, 'Sir, I’ll be praying for you.'" Obviously, Lowry has not prayed hard enough.

But more to the point, also at the dinner with "right-leaning" conservatives was David Brooks, whom Obama asked in jest, "What are you doing here?" In fact, Obama's observation was dead on balls accurate. Lord knows where on the political spectrum Brooks lies or where his mind is wandering. Brooks often seems out of focus.

And so, at a time when Obama is being eviscerated by both left (see: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/opinion/president-obama-misses-a-chance-on-foreign-affairs.html) and right (see: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/05/28/krauthammer-obamas-west-point-speech-was-literally-pointless/) for his petty West Point speech foisting worn out dogmas and replete with recriminations, Brooks brings us his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Art of Focus" (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/opinion/brooks-the-art-of-focus.html?ref=opinion&_r=0). After explaining how children are able to learn more effectively than adults, Brooks concludes his opinion piece by declaring:

"The information universe tempts you with mildly pleasant but ultimately numbing diversions. The only way to stay fully alive is to dive down to your obsessions six fathoms deep. Down there it’s possible to make progress toward fulfilling your terrifying longing, which is the experience that produces the joy."

Six fathoms deep I should seek my terrifying longing that produces joy? Indeed, the "stuff" that animates the cognitive processes of Times readers around the globe. Or as W.C. Fields declared in his immortal 1940 comedy "The Bank Dick," "Sounds like a bubble in a bathtub."

Perhaps, with a smidgen of luck, I can find an alternative "way to stay fully alive."

David Brooks, "The Legitimacy Problem": Americans Are Not Suckers

What happened to David Brooks? Since returning from book writing leave from the op-ed page of The New York Times, he has become tedious and verbose. This was particularly evident in his op-ed entitled "The Tragic Situation" (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/12/david-brooks-tragic-situation-israel-is.html), in which he wrote concerning Israel, "The failure to deal with ambiguity is one of the great disorders of the age." Today, in a Times op-ed entitled "The Legitimacy Problem" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/24/opinion/brooks-the-legitimacy-problem.html?_r=0), Brooks is back with more babble:

"Governing in an age of distrust is different than governing in an age of trust. Government now lacks the legitimacy to impose costs on losers, so politicians face unprecedented pressure to create situations in which everybody looks like winners.

. . . .

The erosion of the mandate won’t kill Obamacare over all. It’ll just make it much more expensive for the government. But the larger lesson is that to sustain a program in this culture, you probably have to rely on policy mechanisms that maximize consumer-style choice, not mandates."

Compare the unintelligibility of David Brooks with the clarity of Charles Krauthammer in his Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Story of the year" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-story-of-the-year/2013/12/19/1d862c98-68f9-11e3-ae56-22de072140a2_story.html?wprss=rss_charles-krauthammer):

"In fact, Obamacare is a full-scale federal takeover. The keep-your-plan-if-you-like-your-plan ruse was a way of saying to the millions of Americans who had insurance and liked what they had: Don’t worry. You’ll be left unmolested. For you, everything goes on as before.

That was a fraud from the very beginning. The law was designed to throw people off their private plans and into government-run exchanges where they would be made to overpay — forced to purchase government-mandated services they don’t need — as a way to subsidize others. (That’s how you get to the ostensible free lunch.)"

Or stated even more succinctly, Obamacare amounted to a con job upon consumers, which placed the president at the top of the list of "The biggest Pinocchios of 2013" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/wp/2013/12/16/the-biggest-pinocchios-of-2013/) (Obama garnered three of ten) and "won" the president "Lie of the Year" (http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2013/dec/12/lie-year-if-you-like-your-health-care-plan-keep-it/).

W.C. Fields once stated, "Never give a sucker an even break." Well, Obama and friends are belatedly arriving at the realization that Americans are not suckers and cannot be treated as such.

David Brooks, "Beyond the Brain": The Brain Is Not the Mind

Egbert: "Was I in here last night, and did I spend a 20 dollar bill?"
Joe the Bartender: "Yeah!"
Egbert: "Oh, boy, is that a load off my mind. I thought I'd lost it!"

- W.C. Fields as Egbert Sousé, "Sousé – accent grave over the 'e'!", in "The Bank Dick," 1940

His mind troubled by a host of scandals, including revelations concerning mind mapping efforts by the NSA (see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/07/nsa-prism-records-surveillance-questions), President Obama set off on a globetrotting trip intended to set his mind at ease. Unfortunately, Obama was soon reminded by Putin that the two world leaders are not of the same mind regarding Syria (see: http://news.yahoo.com/russias-putin-says-disagrees-obama-syria-200057452.html). I wonder if Obama remembered his "open microphone" gaffe, during which the US president mindlessly asked Putin to bear in mind that he would have more "flexibility" after the election (see: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/26/us-nuclear-summit-obama-medvedev-idUSBRE82P0JI20120326). Obviously, the two remain minds apart.

Meanwhile, as Obama heads off for Tanzania, which has been involved in a lengthy dispute with the US over human trafficking (see: http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-06-09/opinions/39856653_1_human-trafficking-tanzania-president-obama), those of us with enquiring minds, or even half a mind, wonder who is now minding the store in Washington.

Me? Mindful of this mess, I opened a bottle of Kahlua and again watched "Blade Runner." Rachael was an intelligent "replicant," with presence of mind, but did she actually possess a mind?

My mindset after last night's mind bender? I don't dwell on matters involving the subconscious mind.

Am I engaging in mind games this morning? Hardly. In his latest mind-expanding New York Times op-ed entitled "Beyond the Brain" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/18/opinion/brooks-beyond-the-brain.html?_r=0), David Brooks does not take the time to explain to us the meaning of "mind," but adamantly informs us - twice - that "the brain is not the mind." Brooks writes:

"At the lowbrow level, there are the conference circuit neuro-mappers. These are people who take pretty brain-scan images and claim they can use them to predict what product somebody will buy, what party they will vote for, whether they are lying or not or whether a criminal should be held responsible for his crime.

At the highbrow end, there are scholars and theorists that some have called the 'nothing buttists.' Human beings are nothing but neurons, they assert. Once we understand the brain well enough, we will be able to understand behavior.

. . . .

These two forms of extremism are refuted by the same reality. The brain is not the mind.

. . . .

Right now we are compelled to rely on different disciplines to try to understand behavior on multiple levels, with inherent tensions between them. Some people want to reduce that ambiguity by making one discipline all-explaining. They want to eliminate the confusing ambiguity of human freedom by reducing everything to material determinism.

But that is the form of intellectual utopianism that always leads to error. An important task these days is to harvest the exciting gains made by science and data while understanding the limits of science and data. The next time somebody tells you what a brain scan says, be a little skeptical. The brain is not the mind."

Yes, as terror, cruelty, greed and poverty swirl around us, we should continue to marvel at the sublime human mind.

And if we have a mind, do we have a soul? Truly, a soul-searching issue . . .

Obviously, I woke up on the wrong side of bed (no, this time not on the floor).

Never mind. 

David Brooks, "The Solitary Leaker": Data Mining or Strip Mining?

Were you ever a whistleblower? For almost 40 years I have been privy to government, corporate and military secrets, and during this entire period there was indeed one instance - many years ago - when I wrote to a government regulatory authority concerning the "distribution" of corporate assets among management and highly placed friends. The information was passed from the regulatory authority to the board of directions of this august institution. Given its haste to dispose of this time bomb, they promptly created a new rule: If the source of information is "anonymous," we won't discuss it, i.e. we don't care if it's true. On the other hand, serious efforts were undertaken to determine who was responsible for the leak.

Me? I learned that there is much to be said for the pleasure of growing broccoli, sans anxiety, in my garden.

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "The Solitary Leaker" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/11/opinion/brooks-the-solitary-leaker.html?_r=0), David Brooks addresses the leak by Edward Snowden of "data mining procedures of the National Security Agency." Brooks claims that Snowden engaged in a series of betrayals against "honesty and integrity," "friends," "employers," "open government," "the privacy of us all," and "the Consitution." Yup, that's a whole lot of betraying.

But hold your horses, David. NSA "data mining procedures"? Given the enormity of the information being gathered, the limited value of this information, and the resultant damage to the Constitutional rights of the individual, I prefer to label this "strip mining."

Brooks, of course, argues, "If federal security agencies can’t do vast data sweeps, they will inevitably revert to the older, more intrusive eavesdropping methods." My goodness, federal security agencies will need to go after bad guys with names after first obtaining court orders for wiretaps?  Just think, in the interests of privacy and First Amendment freedom, they might just have to do things the oldfangled, time consuming way. What a disaster!

Brooks isn't concerned about Snowden's claim that "I, sitting at my desk, certainly had the authorities to wiretap anyone, from you or your accountant, to a federal judge or even the president, if I had a personal e-mail" (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/09/edward-snowden-nsa-whistleblower-surveillance)? I certainly am worried.

Brooks writes, "The founders did not create the United States so that some solitary 29-year-old could make unilateral decisions about what should be exposed." On the other hand, I would argue that the founders did not create the United States so that some solitary 29-year-old could access from his desk the most intimate thoughts of any citizen.

Brooks concludes:

"Judging by his comments reported in the news media so far, Snowden was obsessed with the danger of data mining but completely oblivious to his betrayals and toward the damage he has done to social arrangements and the invisible bonds that hold them together."

Well, in case Brooks hasn't noticed, we have just begun to learn to what extent "social arrangements and the invisible bonds that hold them together" have unraveled without connection to Snowden. A US ambassador can be sacrificed without his government so much as lifting a finger to protect him in order to perpetuate a pre-election myth that the president had brought al-Qaeda to heel. The IRS can engage in flagrant discrimination against conservative organizations (I am not a conservative), while making "Star Trek" movies and spending millions of dollars on lavish conferences. The EPA can similarly engage in discrimination against conservative organizations (see: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2013/06/10/now-the-environmental-protection-agency/#more-826874).  The Department of Energy can engage in nepotistic hiring practices (see: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/06/10/report-nepotism-open-and-widely-accepted-at-energy-department/?hpid=z3).

"Social arrangements and the invisible bonds that hold them together"? As W.C. Fields once said, "Sounds like a bubble in a bathtub."

Don't get me wrong: I don't agree with the manner in which Snowden leaked this information, and he should be extradited and prosecuted. However, I also believe that NSA outsourcing and "strip mining procedures" need to be urgently reviewed and radically revised.

And then there is also that "small" matter of how James Clapper lied to the Senate. As observed by Dana Milbank in an opinion piece entitled "Edward Snowden’s NSA leaks are backlash of too much secrecy" in today's Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/dana-milbank-edward-snowdens-nsa-leaks-are-the-backlash-of-too-much-secrecy/2013/06/10/eddb4462-d215-11e2-a73e-826d299ff459_story.html?hpid=z2):

"Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) asked Clapper at a Senate hearing in March, 'Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?'

'No, sir,' Clapper testified.

'It does not?' Wyden pressed.

'Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently, perhaps, collect, but not wittingly.'

We now know that Clapper was not telling the truth."

Query for Brooks: When America's Director of National Intelligence is prepared to tell falsehoods to Congress, what does this say of his precious "social arrangements and the invisible bonds that hold them together"?

Gail Collins, "An Ode to Helium": "Sounds Like a Bubble in a Bathtub"

Gail Collins is cute. Today, in a New York Times op-ed entitled "An Ode to Helium" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/04/opinion/collins-an-ode-to-helium.html?_r=0), she writes in customary style:

"We’ve been complaining about the way Congress fails at everything except scheduling vacations. So it seems only fair to salute the Responsible Helium Administration and Stewardship Act. The way things are going, it could be the most significant piece of legislation to make it into law this year."

I would contrast Collins's piece of fluff with Charles Krauthammer's Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Obama: The fall" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/obama-the-fall/2013/05/02/6fa564c4-b348-11e2-9a98-4be1688d7d84_story.html?tid=pm_pop), in which he writes:

"For Obama, gun control was a political disaster. He invested capital. He went on a multi-city tour. He paraded grieving relatives. And got nothing. An assault-weapons ban — a similar measure had passed the Congress 20 years ago — lost 60 to 40 in a Senate where Democrats control 55 seats. Obama failed even to get mere background checks.

All this while appearing passive, if not helpless, on the world stage. On Syria, Obama is nervously trying to erase the WMD red line he had so publicly established. On Benghazi, he stonewalled accusations that State Department officials wishing to testify are being blocked.

He is even taking heat for the Boston bombings. Every day brings another revelation of signals missed beforehand. And his post-bombing pledge to hunt down those responsible was mocked by the scandalous Mirandizing of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, gratuitously shutting down information from the one person who knows more than anyone about possible still-existent explosives, associates, trainers, future plans, etc."

I would also contrast Collins's cheeriness with the news that middle-aged Americans have grown desperate and are taking their own lives as never before. As reported by The Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/study-suicide-rate-for-middle-aged-americans-up-28-percent-over-decade-40-pct-for-whites/2013/05/02/cb339740-b341-11e2-9fb1-62de9581c946_story.html):

"The suicide rate among middle-aged Americans climbed a startling 28 percent in a decade, a period that included the recession and the mortgage crisis, the government reported Thursday."

As one reader of this blog wrote in a comment yesterday:

"Millions of us lost our careers at 50 due to endemic age discrimination that no one in politics will even discuss.

I read the Reuters report on this, which did NOT divert attention from the lost jobs reason - looks like the NYT did their usual spin to make it about anything but the missing jobs.

I stopped caring more than a year ago (my last job was Jan 5, 2001 but I kept trying for six more years, two more degrees, five business plans, all for naught), and not surprised at all by the rise in suicides. There would be a lot more if people were not afraid they would fail at that as well."

Collins's ode to helium? As W.C. Fields once said, "Sounds like a bubble in a bathtub."

Thomas Friedman, "How to Put America Back Together Again": "Change" and "Forward" Aren't Working?

Unlike Maureen Dowd (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/04/maureen-dowd-no-bully-in-pulpit.html), Thomas Friedman has the decency to make passing reference today to the travesty in Boston. In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "How to Put America Back Together Again" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/21/opinion/sunday/friedman-how-to-put-america-back-together-again.html?pagewanted=all), Friedman begins:

"UNTIL we fully understand what turned two brothers who allegedly perpetrated the Boston Marathon bombings into murderers, it is hard to make any policy recommendation other than this: We need to redouble our efforts to make America stronger and healthier so it remains a vibrant counterexample to whatever bigoted ideology may have gripped these young men. With all our warts, we have built a unique society — a country where a black man, whose middle name is Hussein, whose grandfather was a Muslim, can run for president and first defeat a woman in his own party and then four years later a Mormon from the opposition, and no one thinks twice about it. With so many societies around the world being torn apart, especially in the Middle East, it is vital that America survives and flourishes as a beacon of pluralism.

Rebuilding our strength has to start with healing our economy."

Friedman doesn't understand "what turned two brothers who allegedly perpetrated the Boston Marathon bombings into murderers"? Let me provide Tom with the answer: It's called radical Islam, and all the kindness showered upon these two refugees from Chechnya did nothing to prevent them from turning Boston's Boylston Street red with blood. Radical Islam opposes women's rights. It opposes gay rights. It opposes religious freedom. It opposes freedom of speech.

Friedman thinks that "healing our economy" is going to change the minds of jihadists intent on destroying America? True, ten years of US economic growth ended in March 2001, just months prior to the September 11 attacks; however, does Friedman really wish to contend that if the US economy had remained strong going into the fall of 2001, we would not have seen 9/11? Sorry, Tom, but Radical Islamists are going to hate the US whether the economy is good or bad.

Regarding his miracle cure for the economy, Friedman writes:

"A phased-in carbon tax of $20 to $25 a ton could raise around $1 trillion over 10 years."

A total of $1 trillion "over 10 years" and possibly "revenue neutral"? Well, that would be truly remarkable were it not for the fact that federal debt is now more than $16.8 trillion and growing by the second.

A phased-in carbon tax? As W.C. Fields once said, "Sounds like a bubble in a bathtub."

Maureen Dowd, "The Pungent Aroma of Paranoia": An "Acceptable Ending" to the War in Iraq?

In her latest New York Times opinion piece, "The Pungent Aroma of Paranoia" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/18/opinion/sunday/dowd-the-pungent-aroma-of-paranoia.html?_r=1&ref=opinion), Maureen Dowd would have us believe that Obama and Biden have brought the war in Iraq to an "acceptable ending":

"You’d never know it, given Republicans’ churlish silence and unseemly sniping, but the president and the vice president have stumbled and bumbled their way to an acceptable ending to the war that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney so recklessly started."

I opposed the Second Gulf War, given the likelihood that it would upset the delicate equilibrium of power between Saddam in Iraq and the mullahs in Iran, but will we now see an "acceptable ending"? I doubt it. I anticipate renewed fighting among Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, and that Iraq's 400,000 Christians will soon begin a mass exodus from the country.

The door has also been opened for Iran to expand its sphere of influence, as evidenced by Ahmadinejad's plans to visit Iraq's Kurdistan Region "to discuss the nature of border problems between both sides and to develop bilateral trade relations" (http://www.ekurd.net/mismas/articles/misc2011/11/state5601.htm). This is all the more remarkable given Iran's history of persecuting its own Kurdish minority.

As acknowledged by Dowd:

"The White House knows that, while politics has broken out in Iraq, there are multiple flashpoints in the next year that, if not controlled, could blow up and bring down the precarious house of cards. They can only pray that Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki keeps his promises about Iran. And that, before some firefight between rival groups spins out of control, the various Iraqi tribes consider the costs of pulling the plug."

Sorry to be a pessimist, but you can count on that ugly firefight, which is the only way things get "resolved" in this region. Iraq's Sunni elite will not surrender their socioeconomic power to the Shiite majority, as evidenced what is happening on a micro scale in Bahrain, and the Kurds will fight to the end to preserve their autonomy in the north.

An "acceptable ending"? No way, but perhaps there is no "acceptable ending." Given Iran's provocative behavior of late, which has gone unchecked by Obama, who refuses to sanction the Iranian central bank, the timing of American withdrawal could not be worse; however, as the immortal W.C. Fields once said:

"There comes a time in the affairs of man when he must take the bull by the tail and face the situation."

Notwithstanding the sign on the door, "you broke it, you bought it," perhaps it's long past time to hightail out of there, before its costs, combined with those from the inane ground war in Afghanistan, swallow the American economy whole.