David Brooks's god has failed

David Brooks has a touted column to start the new year, headlined, "The God that Failed."

It's about people's overexpectations of government in the current post-Detroit terror hubbub.

Sounds great, no?

Well, hold on. Before Brooks gets to his point, which is halfway good, he has plenty of swamp water through which he wads.

As with a typical David Brooks column, let's play "spot the error" under the
guise of superciliousness.

First graf: Claims Congress exacerbated the Depression. WRONG. Only when FDR
tried to play budget balancer did unemployment start to rise again.

Second graf: Torpedoes sinking Jap troop ships carrying American POWs? Yes,it
happened, but "horrific mistake" is not the right phrase, IMO.

Third graf: The almost inevitable Brooksian straw man. (Maybe only Friedman
exceeds him here.) I never expected "perfection" from govt, just a higher degree
of competence, a less total degree of sellout to Wall Street, etc., than we
actually got, over the last 15-plus years, from many members of Congress of
both parties, on fiscal issues.

Following grafs: Let's not forget the GOP stalling Obama's TSA head nomination,
voting against some security funding increases, etc.

Beyond that, let's not forget the blindsight of trying to paper over old errors,
in the bureaucracy.

Beyond that, let's not forget that in, at least some cases, we ARE making new
enemies, by engaging in wars of choice, firing Predators and even worse, cruise
missiles, somewhat willy nilly, etc.

I don't expect perfection in foreign policy. I do expect less politicization,
along with less counter-politicization from the man who promised change.

Take David Broder, make him 25-30 years younger, throw in a healthy dash of
"earnestness," make him a bit more conservative, and you have David Brooks.

And, in this case, as so often with him, the "god that failed" is the god of
simplemindedness in punditry. Of course, way too many Americans ARE
simpleminded. Per MOG, with his experience abroad, I have no doubt will still
lag Western Europe in that regard.

So, to some degree, Brooks is writing to America's lowest common denominator.

Beyond that, the REAL "god that failed," and continues to fail, as the failure
gift that keeps on giving, is the naive belief in American exceptionalism, a
belief to which I believe Mssr. Brooks is also not totally immune.

As Pogo said: "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Strangely, without mentioning the number of Brooks' usual problems that pop up in this column, Greenwald likes it.