David Brooks Wants His Daddy

The authors of this blog have our differences, but one thing we can both agree on is that David Brooks is awful. He's awful for a lot of reasons, but in his latest column he does something right, and admirable. He openly admits that he's the kind of beta male who, in tough times, looks for someone, ANYONE, to tell him what to do.

In 1933, Franklin Roosevelt inherited an economic crisis. He understood that his first job was to restore confidence, to give people a sense that somebody was in charge, that something was going to be done.

This is meant to parallel the current situation, except that Roosevelt inherited an economic crisis that had been unfolding over a course of years rather than a couple of weeks. Note that Brooks praises Roosevelt not for actually doing anything to solve the crisis, but instead for making people feel better. The way David Brooks wishes someone would make him feel better. Someone with a strong masculine voice that would tell David Brooks that everything is going to be okay, and strong masculine arms that could wrap David Brooks up and make him feel warm, safe, and secure.

This generation of political leaders is confronting a similar situation,

No. Not at all. It's not just that the causes are somewhat different, but it's also been well under a month since all this really started to unfold. Once again, Roosevelt had years to think about his crisis, and ran on a campaign specifically targeted to deal with it.

and, so far, they have failed utterly and catastrophically to project any sense of authority, to give the world any reason to believe that this country is being governed.

David Brooks wants his daddy to make him feel like someone is in charge. David Brooks wants everyone else to know that his daddy is taking care of things. David Brooks isn't that worried that daddy get things right and actually help the crisis, just that he tell everyone he's doing something.

George W. Bush is completely out of juice, having squandered his influence with Republicans as well as Democrats.

Note that his juice was squandered by ramming through legislation that later turned out disastrous to the point where whenever he suggests doing something everyone immediately becomes suspicious of that course of action.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is a smart moneyman, but an inept legislator. He was told time and time again that House Republicans would not support his bill, and his response was to get down on bended knee before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

He proposed to her? That is a rather unexpected negotiating strategy.

House leaders of both parties got wrapped up in their own negotiations, but did it occur to any of them that it might be hard to pass a bill fairly described as a bailout to Wall Street?

Probably. Perhaps they felt pressured by the media to ram something through in order to look authoritative.

Let us recognize above all the 228 [congresspeople] who voted no — the authors of this revolt of the nihilists. They showed the world how much they detest their own leaders and the collected expertise of the Treasury and Fed.

WHY WON'T THEY FOLLOW THEIR MASTERS? What do they think, that they're elected representatives of their districts who are responsible both individually and collectively for doing what's in the best interest of the nation and their constituents? That's not the way David Brooks sees it. Their job is to get down on 'bended knee' and lick the boots of their superiors, just like David Brooks does when his mistress tells him he's been bad. Disobedience is very disrespectful.

They did the momentarily popular thing

I.E. what their constituents wanted

and if the country slides into a deep recession, they will have the time and leisure to watch public opinion shift against them.

As opposed to if they rammed the bill through, it didn't work, and the country went into recession AND the government was broke.

House Republicans led the way and will get most of the blame.

Bad boys and girls.

It has been interesting to watch them on their single-minded mission to destroy the Republican Party.

Because that's what they're doing. Single mindedly trying to destroy the Republican Party. Not sticking up for their constituents or their beliefs or any of that foolishness. They're trying to take down the G.O.P.

Not long ago, they led an anti-immigration crusade that drove away Hispanic support.

To be fair, they were really trying to keep the Hispanic support from getting into the country in the first place.

Then, too, they listened to the loudest and angriest voices in their party, oblivious to the complicated anxieties that lurk in most American minds.

Anxieties like "Will my wife find out that those credit card charges at The Dungeon weren't really just a mixup with Kristoff for one of his sex slavery pieces."

Now they have once again confused talk radio with reality. If this economy slides, they will go down in history as the Smoot-Hawleys of the 21st century.

A) I have a degree in political science with a concentration in American politics, so I vaguely know what the Smooth-Hawley tariff act was, but can you really use this reference with impunity in this day and age? Most Americans can't name the fourth amendment of the constitution, let alone the ninth or the sixteenth. Are we really expecting them to catch this one?

B) The Smoot-Hawley tariff act was an example of overlegislating (Raising tariffs in response to competition from imports) rather than an example of failing to act in crisis. In fact one could argue persuasively that the Smoot-Hawley tariff act is an example of why congress shouldn't always act, and certainly shouldn't act impulsively and without careful consideration.

C) You can't pluralize Smoot-Hawley like that. Smoot-Hawley was not a family name, it was the name of the act sponsored by those two men. You'd have to threaten that the congressmen would look like the Smoots and Hawleys of the 21st century, which wouldn't really work either because there was only one Smoot and one Hawley (for the purposes of this discussion) in the 20th century, but at least it would sort of work. Shouldn't the New York Times be doing a better job of copyediting, especially for a column that presumably has a decent lead time.

With this vote, they’ve taken responsibility for this economy, and they will be held accountable.

God, NO! Congress taking responsibility for something and being held ACCOUNTABLE? Won't somebody think of the children? THINK OF THE CHILDREN!

I’ve spoken with several House Republicans over the past few days and most admirably believe in free-market principles.

Principles? Among House Republicans? I think we may have a Jayson Blair situation here.

What’s sad is that they still think it’s 1984.

I don't think David Brooks consciously intended to reference Orwell's classic (Though I do think he is waiting for Big Brother to arrive with the fervent hope of an Evangelical waiting for Jesus, except with more erections.) but if not, why choose 1984 specifically, instead of 1983 or 1985? You have to be carefully randomly throwing that year around, just like you can't say "I hate September 11th, because I lost my wallet on that day in 1997." Someone's already called dibs on 1984.

They still think the biggest threat comes from socialism and Walter Mondale liberalism. They seem not to have noticed how global capital flows have transformed our political economy.

Whoops. Neither did anybody else.

We’re living in an age when a vast excess of capital sloshes around the world fueling cycles of bubble and bust.

It's a tsunami of money. And just like a tsunami it can only be described in passive terms because there's no group of people actually in control of this thing!

When the capital floods into a sector or economy, it washes away sober business practices, and habits of discipline and self-denial.

I love the passive language here. This tsunami of cash washes away sober business practices while bankers desperately cling to them, trying to prevent themselves from taking stupid greedy risks. But they can't. The tsunami of money MADE them do it.

Then the money managers panic and it sloshes out, punishing the just and unjust alike.

Not to burst your 'bubble' Mr. Brooks, but ummm...hasn't that been the opposite of the case? Haven't the unjust and irresponsible lost a crapload of money while those who refrained from betting heavily on unsubstantiated securities have stayed in business and in some cases even profited from the situation?

What we need in this situation is authority.

Someone to take control with a firm voice, strong words, and lots of paddlings for naughty boys like David Brooks. Seriously, though, is there a situation where David Brooks doesn't call for the consolidation of power and for someone to tell everyone what to do? Can you imagine one?

Not heavy-handed government regulation,

This is where Brooks remembers that he's supposed to be a principled Republican instead of a worm who wants somebody to order him around.

but the steady and powerful hand of some public institutions that can guard against the corrupting influences of sloppy money and then prevent destructive contagions when the credit dries up.

Heady stuff. Definitely the kind of thing you'd want to organize during a few short weeks of panic and confusion. Because making such decisions based on fear never ever goes wrong.

The Congressional plan was nobody’s darling, but it was an effort to assert some authority

Remember, asserting authority in response to economic crisis ALWAYS ENDS WELL

It was an effort to alter the psychology of the markets. People don’t trust the banks; the bankers don’t trust each other. It was an effort to address the crisis of authority in Washington.

Authority is the official word of the day.

At least it might have stabilized the situation so fundamental reforms of the world’s financial architecture could be undertaken later.

We'll get to the actual change later, now is not the time for trying to fix stuff, it's time to spend $700 billion to buy some peace of mind.

But the 228 House members who voted no have exacerbated the global psychological free fall, and now we have a crisis of political authority on top of the crisis of financial authority.

Two authorities in one sentence. I imagine David Brooks writing that sentence down, quietly high-fiving himself in his cubicle, and then furiously masturbating to the thought of a jackboot stepping softly on his scrotum.

The only thing now is to try again — to rescue the rescue. There’s no time to find a brand-new package, so the Congressional plan should go up for another vote on Thursday, this time with additions that would change its political prospects.

If at first you don't succeed, stuff the bill full of pork until everyone compromises their principles.

If that doesn’t happen, the world could be in for some tough economic times (the Europeans, apparently, have not even begun to acknowledge their toxic debt) — but also tough political times.

The American century was created by American leadership, which is scarcer than credit just about now.

And authority costs $25o an hour or $6oo for a three hour block.

David Brooks needs his credit, people.