Is David Brooks Really That Stupid?

I'm not a fan of David Brooks. By which I mean that I slogged through Bobos in Paradise years ago, found the argument wanting and finished the book unconvinced of his premise. I sometimes read his Op-Ed column in the NY Times. (Sometimes I even agree with him.) That said, I don't have any real problem with him.

So I thought that Byard Duncan of Alternet was being over the top when he described Brook's column in the Times as "the stupidest thing you will read all year." First because no matter how stupid something may be, there is always the chance that something even more stupid will emerge, that's just life. Second, come on, Duncan, you're a pro, you can do better than that.

It was at that precise point in reading that I stopped looking at Duncan's piece and clicked on over to Brooks' and read it.

Jesus. H. Tap-dancing. Christ. Duncan was right.

Brooks is writing an opinion piece. That's fine. I get it. As such, the column doesn't have to include a crapload of data. But sometimes I wonder whether Brooks is even trying to put the pieces together. Sometimes I wonder if he even knows that there is a puzzle to be put together. Or does he just write what his ideology determines that he must write in order to maintain his own political integrity? Believe it or not, I'd prefer that second answer be the correct one, because if it is, then it just means that Brooks is a mere party hack in a great wide sea of party hacks. Disappointing but not unusual. 

If however, he writes after processing, then wow, what a mind. And not in a good way. Not in a way that seems based on the same world I walk around in every day.

Duncan's article has already focused on two aspects of Brooks' argument--that reporters are too nosy and mouthing off to the agents of the Commander In Chief is no different than complaining about one's boss over beers at the bar after work, so I won't rehash that here. Two other points--that Stanley McChrystal is a jerk and that he represents a clear and present danger to the civilian authority that general officers owe their loyalty and livelihoods (made by James Kunstler and Ray McGovern respectively--have also already been made.

Here is the bit that I found most amazing about Brooks' argument:

General McChrystal was excellent at his job. He had outstanding relations with the White House and entirely proper relationships with his various civilian partners in the State Department and beyond. He set up a superb decision-making apparatus that deftly used military and civilian expertise.

I'm not sure what standards Brooks used to evaluate the worth of a general to find him "excellent" but let that slide--after all this is opinion. I would like to know why if he was so fracking excellent we haven't  won Afghanistan yet. But that's just me.

But McChrystal, like everyone else, kvetched. And having apparently missed the last 50 years of cultural history, he did so on the record, in front of a reporter. And this reporter, being a product of the culture of exposure, made the kvetching the center of his magazine profile.

By putting the kvetching in the magazine, the reporter essentially took run-of-the-mill complaining and turned it into a direct challenge to presidential authority. He took a successful general and made it impossible for President Obama to retain him.

The reticent ethos had its flaws. But the exposure ethos, with its relentless emphasis on destroying privacy and exposing impurities, has chased good people from public life, undermined public faith in institutions and elevated the trivial over the important.

Another scalp is on the wall. Government officials will erect even higher walls between themselves and the outside world. The honest and freewheeling will continue to flee public life, and the cautious and calculating will remain.

The culture of exposure has triumphed, with results for all to see.

It's all that damned reporter's fault. Yeah, right. Congratulations, Michael Hastings of Rolling Stone. You have somehow commanded god-like attention from god-like individuals in a god-like government and are apparently personally responsible for destroying the career of a brilliant general officer. You cad.

Is Brooks that f---ing stupid?