David Brooks mocks dems' use of military imagery

[Cocoa]

Add this to the growing list of things that Brooks is troubled by now, but which he never commented on just a few years ago:

-- the incivility in politics these days
-- using "values" in politics
-- using military imagery in politics

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/03/opinion/03broo.html

<snip>

We've just finished a Democratic convention, of all things, that was little more than a long military worship session. John Kerry's military heroism was celebrated while the rest of his career was nearly forgotten. Bill Clinton said it was more honorable to have served in Vietnam than to have evaded service, and the multitudes, many of whom had evaded, cheered madly. Middle-aged peace activists who had despised the military in the Westmoreland era now paid lavish homage to it in the Shalikashvili era.

I get the feeling these bipolar attitudes arise from a cocktail of ignorance, guilt and envy. First, there are large demographic chunks of the nation in which almost nobody serves. People there may not know what's bigger, a brigade or a battalion.

At the same time, they know there's something unjust in the fact that they get to enjoy America while others sacrifice for it, and sense deep down that there's something ennobling in military service. It involves some set of character tests they didn't get in summer internships. As Samuel Johnson piercingly observed, "Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier."

<snip>

My own instinct is that we need an ambitious national service program to demystify the military for the next generation of Americans. It also seems clear, looking at our history, that combat heroism is not an essential qualification for a wartime leader. It's much more important to have the political courage that Lincoln had and Kennedy celebrated. But don't listen to me. I never served.

[tom_paine]

1. Axis Sally mocks Jewish images of Military Service and Patriotism

So? Just the same tired shit that Nazis, even today's Kinder and Gentler Version, have been writing about their enemies for years.

Is David Brooks one of our growing legion of Jewish Kinder and Genlter Nazis? (I am Jewish)

I think he just might be. But regardless of his religion he is as slavishly devoted to his Fuhrer as any Nazi Scribe in 1938.

[dand]

2. Brooks makes my skin crawl,

I have to hold my nose to read his column, I thank you for posting it though, he is one of the reasons American "journalism" is an international joke.