Haven't seen this guy in a while.
Wednesday at the laundromat I encountered a woman who was, literally, washing the blood out of the clown suit. Because I am a naturally friendly person, I said, “Washing blood out of a clown suit, huh?” When that failed to elicit a response of shared humor, I said, “You know, like the joke?” In this way did I find myself in the position of having to tell a joke predicated on violent clown pedophilia to a complete stranger—and not just any stranger, but one who herself was, or was in love with, a clown. I mention this sad episode of aging bachelorhood to advance the thesis that there are two broad categories of humor: that which we undertake intentionally and that which we do not. In an effort to send you gliding into your weekend on a puff of blithe joviality, not to mention finish this shit quickly and get on to other things, Combat! blog presents instances of both types of humor, albeit with a preponderance of the former.
First, the unintentional. Both Micky and Mike sent me links to David Brooks’s column in today’s Times, Micky with qualified admiration and Mike with utter disdain. Where Micky cited the need for a defined moderate political coalition that might manifest itself in a third party, Mike liked Brooks’s rhetorical strategy to that of Tuesdays With Morrie. After much deliberation, I have decided that both gentlemen are right. The center of American politics is moderate not only in values but expression, and that is a terrible loss; Congress and the country need a politically savvy, ideologically explicit middle, and Brooks may have diagnosed our national ailment pointing out its absence. Man, do I hate his smug WASP presentation, though. His story of an angry voter named Ben is also about an angry reader named Dan. There is a gem in there, though: disagreement with David Brooks: “For Ben, right and wrong is contained in the relationship between effort and reward. If people do not work but get rewarded, that’s wrong. If people work and do not get rewarded, that’s wrong.” Personally, I don’t think it’s wrong when people do not work but get rewarded. It’s often a necessary error for preventing the second condition, which is far more wrong.
But enough of that political-ethical crap. Philosophy is boring as plain fudge, especially in comparison with the walnut caramel swirl that is history. Behold:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1T5gQHa2pq4
I think that might be the best Drunk History yet, even if it conspicuously lacks Jake Johnson. My pain at his absence is assuaged by John C. Reilly, who seems to have found his calling as a comic actor. He was so good in True West, too.
We can’t live in the past, though—except maybe we can, because Chris Stangl has returned to updating his genius hypercriticism blog Permanent Monday, in which he analyzes the technical and semiological aspects of Garfield comic strips and generally makes life worth living again. I’m going to say that Permanent Monday is the best thing in history ever to die and come back to life. I once spent eight hours reading the archives, although it’s possible that I am a special case. Click on the link and become a special case yourself.
While we’re praising things, I would like to express my hope that Ed Lover never dies. Once that wish is granted, I’d like to add that he never stop making C’mon Son, which is A) hilarious even when it’s unaccountably amateurish, as it is here, and B) a medicinal-grade hangover cure. Enjoy:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEE0xW6lLR4
I think this David Brooks column is one of the worst I’ve ever read.
First, it has no worthwhile content. David begins by creating a fictional everyman to parrot his opinions for him while swathing them in the clothing of a “real American,” which (somewhat to his credit) he knows he’s incapable of claiming. But nobody should be fooled by this, because it’s tired, cliched, and artless. His writing is for s**t.
Second, the column is anti-historical. He cites Abraham Lincoln as an example of a moderate. Yes indeed, Lincoln was so moderate that seven states seceded from the Union because they refused to recognize his election. Lincoln was actually pretty radical on the issues of the day, like slavery and government investment in infrastructure. There has never been an organized “moderate center” in American politics, or any other political system, because the center does not actually exist. It is a chimera produced by self-conscious compromise between two real, articulated viewpoints.
Third, David clearly hasn’t thought out his position. Brooks is essentially begging his readers to vote for bland centrists to run a status quo Fordist regime of the kind that America had in the post-war era–an era when, for all the stultifying conformity and entrenched racism, working-class (white male) Americans got a fair share of the national wealth. What Davy forgets is that Fordism entailed stuff like a top marginal tax rate of 70-80%, which falls a long goddamn way outside the “platform” of current centrism.
In summary, this column = dogs**t.
So I wonder what David Brooks, an “opinion” “writer” at the top of his profession, is thinking about when he cashes his fat NYT paychecks. Is he thinking about how people ought to earn what they deserve?
Yeah “David.” I don’t have enough time to figure out your name but I’m gonna naysay. Nay, I say, David. Hahahahahahahahaaaaaaa!
I disagree with Evan’s comment that the center hasn’t ever existed and (more importantly to me) the implication that it couldn’t in the future. The Blue Dog Democrats are an example of a group organizing itself in the middle of at least some issues – fiscally conservative but potentially more socially liberal. You can disagree with them, but they’re an easy example of what a moderate approach could look like. I think David Brooks is arguing for a more organized moderate group. It is easy to imagine what that could mean in US politics today in terms of approach (public and personal commitment to hearing multiple viewpoints, letting evidence/research dictate policy at least as much if not more than ideology, and more restrained rhetoric) and even policy (maintain current tax policy, diminish spending particularly through efficiency, look at reforming social security without wholly privatizing it, etc). More likely, perhaps, is that individuals with a variety of viewpoints could form a coalition based on shared goals. One could disagree with such a group, of course, but I don’t see how they would be any less real than today’s conservatives or liberals. All of these things are social constructions, but so is just about everything after eating and sleeping.
‘Yeah “David.” I don’t have enough time to figure out your name but I’m gonna naysay. Nay, I say, David. Hahahahahahahahaaaaaaa!’
Carly, I was criticizing the _David_ Brooks column to which _Dan_ Brooks linked in the second paragraph of Friday’s post. I’m really not sure how you could have failed to notice this, nor can I think of a way it could have been made more clear.
“One could disagree with such a group, of course, but I don’t see how they would be any less real than today’s conservatives or liberals.”
Mike B., what I was saying is that the order of operations is wrong. I was reacting to my perception that David Brooks was fetishizing centrism as a principle in itself, which is something that he does pretty frequently. You can’t start with the proposition of centrism. First you have to formulate your political platform according to the principles in which you believe and the policies you think will achieve them. Only then is it possible to say whether your platform is “centrist” or “moderate” by comparing it to the poles of the political discussion.
Of course there are political organizations that can be described as “centrist” because they happened to be to the left of the right and to the right of the left. But there has never been one whose organizing principle was centrism. To take up the example of Blue Dogs, you’re talking about people who mostly ascribe to beliefs that would have fit comfortably into mainstream conservatism during the 1980s, but who are now centrists by virtue of the fact that the political spectrum as a whole has moved rightward.