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Friday, October 28, 2005

Crack Smokin'

I actually use this phrase, in conversations with the better half, when I hear someone say something that demonstrates that they have been, er, smoking crack. At least figuratively. (I should also add that I sing the phrase. To the melody of the Beastie Boys' Brass Monkey.)

Well, this week's crack smoker is David Brooks (a previous award-winner). This is from his column yesterday, which was on GWB's second term-itis. He argued that the President, like Reagan, can turn these things around, and thus focus on "the key challenges that face the country." Are you ready for his list of said challenges? OK. Prepare your mind. . . . . Here it is: "keeping up with China, rebalancing the fiscal situation, rebuilding confidence in the war on terror."

OMG. "[K]eeping up with China," number one. OK, a "key challenge," indeed. I'd be the last to disagree. But. But number one? Second, "rebalancing the fiscal situation." Dave, Dave, Dave . . . it's called a budget. Not a "situation." Sudden moment of realization . . . if you think a budget is a . . . situation . . . then it's not a deficit . . . it's a situation. Finally, "rebuilding confidence in the war on terror." Now, assuming, for the moment that there is something called "the war on terror," I would agree that winning this war would be a "key challenge." But merely rebuilding public confidence in it? Does that mean that the third key challenge facing the Administration and the country is a frackin' public relations problem? It is, if you are . . . crack smokin'.

But the worst part. In the entire column, Brooks doesn't use a certain four-letter word. I-R-A-Q.

If anyone out there thinks that Bush's second-term problems aren't primarily about the Iraq war (not some generalized war against terror), I'd like to hear it.

3 Comments:

At 11:39 PM, Blogger Paul said...

I agree. Fitzgerald stayed within bounds -- I do not think he will be accused of playing the part of Ahab again. He was especially effective at making the point about how serious perjury and obstruction are, and why, so I'm pretty sure we won't see any more of those "indicted on a technicality" arguments like we saw floated about the past few weeks. My only criticism is that Ihat I think he should have made it more clear that he did not indict the actual leak, not because Plame/Wilson was not covered by the law, but because he couldn't get inside Libby's head and prove his motives in a court of law. In all fairness, he did more or less say this several times -- I really liked his baseball analogy: Plame was definitely beaned, but whether or not it was intentional, who can say other than the pitcher? But he should have hammered that idea home a few more times in less subtle ways. As it is, the defenders of Bush/Cheney will have an easier time now spinning the idea that "the leak wasn't a crime," not that they will be right to do so, but Fitzgerald left this open to them in my opinion. Of course guys like Brooks are so creative they can frame anything to suit their agenda no matter how tortured the logic.

Ivy

 
At 11:43 PM, Blogger Paul said...

Ooops! That last comment should have been posted under "Thought on Fitzgerald" rather than Crack Smokin'.

-Ivy

 
At 11:07 AM, Blogger tenaciousmcd said...

If you haven't noticed, Brooks is smokin' crack on a regular basis. This latest collumn follows closely on the heels of his "Bush saved conservatism by morphing his administration into a model of European-style, good-government Christian Democracy." Whew! And I all this time I though he was Franco meets Friedman.

Although I hate to admit it, I kind of like Brooks--he's at least something other that your normal mouth-breating, Bush-worshipping ideologue. But he is always living in a state of altered reality. At core, he's a pop mythologist rather than the sardonic and clear-eyed social critic he styles himself--hence all the hokie, funny, and often wrong red-blue stereotypes that are perfect cover for the conservative movement's obsession with faked authenticty. One of the most telling pieces I've read by him was a paean to Walt Whitman's Democratic Vistas he wrote for the Atlantic a couple of years ago. DV is great post-Civil War mythmaking, less a true history than an effort by a union Dem to create an affirming reunification narrative. Brooks used Whitman somewhat incongruously to justify the divisive Iraq War. What his columns are reaching for now is some way that conservatives can heal the national breach that they themselves have created. So mythologizing Bush as something he's not, but as something that would save face and turn the GOP less crazy, is the goal. This may have no connection to the reality of today's GOP, but there are far worse dreams dancing in the heads of the movement cons.

 

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