Evidently, being spectacularly and publicly wrong about both conservatism and the last Black presidential candidate he analyzed has done nothing to blunt Mr Brooks high regard for both himself and the people with whom he’d willingly share a cucumber sandwich.
The GOP is playing a dangerous game with conservatives, classical liberals, and right-libertarians who make up their voting base. And this willingness to try to shame that constitutionalist base into its place — evidently, its place is to vote for who pompous douches like Brooks direct it to vote for, and then go back to shooting possums and eating pork rinds — is going to backfire.
When it does — and when conservatives and classical liberals finally do break with the Republican Party they have not been able to change — we’ll know that we’re serious about taking the country back.
Question is, will we have waited too long?
Chris Wallace’s Breastpocket Handkerchief sniffles, “Yes, too long. Quite. Isn’t it dreamy?” Mr CWHanky doesn’t chant, but if he did it would surely be “We will choose your candidates for you.”
Another question: Who actually pays attention to David Brooks?
It’s too late to get a new party going for 2012, but we can begin planning our break now, with the goal of launching what I like to call OPERATION: WHIG on 07 November 2012.
Doing so will give us four years to get the party structure up and running, and recruit sitting members of the Congress and candidates.
Will we have waited too long? Probably. We’re usually too busy going about our lives, while for statists, politics is their life.
However, I really don’t believe anyone listens to or reads Brooks except other beltway types. We’ve heard of him because we spend a lot of time following politics. Most people don’t know who he is.
This isn’t to say he and his ilk aren’t dangerous, because they get trotted out on news programs as examples of conservatives when they are no such thing. In the sound-bite culture progressives love, emotions hold sway.
The base is already ignoring these people, and I think it will continue to do so. I think this election will prove that. However, if we fail and Romney gets the nod, I’m buying more ammo.
Brooksie was mildly entertaining as Nemo’s dad in that Disney movie, but other than that…
Sounds sort of like what Dan Riehl has been saying. http://www.riehlworldview.com/carnivorous_conservative/2011/11/cain-lied-then-lashed-out-at-the-media.html
I never thought I would see the day that Dan Riehl and David Brooks would morph into one. Sort of like remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers when the pod sucks up the DNA of the sleeping dude and his dog.
PREFESSIONALS RULE! CITIZENS DROOL!
Perhaps we need to redefine The Base. At the very least, I think we need to redefine our spokesmen. And, I am not talking about Brooks, Wallace or Kristol. They went over the wall long ago, if they were ever on the Right side.
I think 2010 was just a warm-up, myself. I expect to see lots of “professional” Republicans hitting the bricks and looking for a real job in 2012. The Senate needs an enema, for one thing.
Thanks David, not just for proving the Codevilla thesis, but putting a face to it.
You do realize that if you’re right, then the Founders were wrong, don’t you?
Oh look Jen Rubin gets a new pet.
The old WHIG party might have been pretty close to what we-all want, but the name?
“The term Whig was originally short for ‘whiggamor’, a term meaning ‘cattle driver’ used to describe western Scots who came to Leith for corn.”
etymology [C17: probably shortened from whiggamore,one of a group of 17th-century Scottish rebels who joined in an attack on Edinburgh known as the whiggamore raid;probably from Scottish whigto drive (of obscure origin) + more, mer, mairehorse, mare]
Bob,
Our friends at Despair have already made up t-shirts for us. I gotta say — mine’s been a hell of a conversation-starter.
How about “The Values Party”!
Am I the only one that heard “boy” at the end of that sentence?
ass. We’ve got a professional governing class, don’t we? We little accountability. Is he advocating even LESS?
I didn’t watch the video, because I don’t feel like cutting myself right now.
Really though, naming a new party ought by rights be left to Rich Lowry and the NRO gang, shouldn’t it? I mean, that’s their job.
How about the Gadsden Party?
Well, of course it is, sdferr. NRO knows what’s best for us.
…share a cucumber sandwich.
Is that code? NTTAWWT.
It’s sort of code. The Hillbuzz started it about a year ago by calling the Romney crew the cucumber sandwich Republicans. Hillbuzz has for a number of reasons been put on my less than required reading list, but they were right on that one. Stopped clocks, etc.
People like him depress me.
Romney? He depresses me, too. There was a nice article about Rick Perry in the Dallas paper yesterday. I still heart Rick Perry.
MJ verdict watch…
Guilty of involuntary manslaughter.
I was thinking of Brooks, but Romney depresses me too. Perry is still on my short list.
I don’t think David Brooks sees himself as Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor exactly, but he might should think a little about the parallels.
I should have been clearer – apologies – but I think we have to make the GOP go the way of the Whigs.
As for a new party name, well, I like Federalist, but I know that won’t fly with many on the Right.
I like Rick fine but he’s his own biggest hurdle
I don’t think David Brooks sees himself as Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor exactly, but he might should think a little about the parallels.
That one left a mark.
Uh, Bob, the Whigs were the party that got destroyed. Like the concept, work on the label.
Naming the new Party? Why should we ignore the obvious?
The Conservative Party.
;^)
After a couple of seconds of thought on it (ha!), maybe we should lean toward The Party Party. Captures the yoots.
David Brooks has the Tom Friedman Disease…
David Brooks: Let’s be honest, the Constitution is silly, what with the idea about citizen legislators. We need a professional governing class. With nicely creased slacks….
[…] all the unelectable candidates we have to go through and rule out? I say from hereon out we just let David Brooks pick the nominee. At least then we’ll have someone professional doing the selecting, and […]
[…] all the unelectable candidates we have to go through and rule out? I say from hereon out we just let David Brooks pick the nominee. At least then we’ll have someone professional doing the selecting, and […]