David Brooks: all a-tingle at his Republican prospects, no joke.

I was going to let this one pass. The man has a family to feed afterall, and presumably has to churn out the copy, whether in possession of any actual insight or not. (Hence, the dismal track record ...)

But if the gloves are off, and he's scoffing at a "joke" , well why be nice and pretend we're not laughing at him out here?

[D]eep in the bowels of the G.O.P., there are serious people having quiet conversations. The people holding these conversations created and admired Bob McDonnell's perfectly executed Virginia gubernatorial campaign. And now as they look to the future of their party, and who might lead it in 2012, the name John Thune keeps popping up.
...
Thune is the junior senator from South Dakota, the man who beat Tom Daschle in an epic campaign five years ago. The first thing everybody knows about him is that he is tall (6 feet 4 inches), tanned (in a prairie, sun-chapped sort of way) and handsome (John McCain jokes that if he had Thune's face he'd be president right now). If you wanted a Republican with the same general body type and athletic grace as Barack Obama, you'd pick Thune.

Umm... is that what you're looking for in a politician, Mr. Brooks? Sounds like a dream date; know much about his family?

The second thing people say about him is that he is unfailingly genial, and nice. He grew up in Murdo, S.D., population 612. His father was a Naval aviator [ed: sexxy stock!] in World War II and a genuine war hero. [ed: nothing excites the senses like a genuine war hero, eh David?]. He was called back home after the war to work in the family hardware store and went on to become an educator, as did his wife.

John was a high school basketball star [ed: *dreamy sigh*] [off-topic: Didja know Sarah Palin was a star point guard?] and possesses idyllic small-town manners, like the perfect boy in a Thornton Wilder play. [ed. -- but can he see any foreign countries from that idyllic small town of his, David?]

He appears to be untouched by cynicism. [ed. -- "untouched" ... like a virgin perhaps?] In speeches and interviews, he is straightforward, intelligent and earnest. He sometimes seems to have emerged straight into the 21st century from a more wholesome time. [ed. -- hmm, wholesome/earnest/non-cynical -- why do I think if he were a woman, even one with a face tanned, in a pretty "prairie-chapped" sort of way, this wholesomeness would merely be greeted as a joke in Washington/New York high society?]

After high school, he attended Biola University, a small Christian college outside of Los Angeles. He then got an M.B.A. from the University of South Dakota, and has spent his adult life ascending... [ed. -- I'm not going to touch the hypocrisy in comparing this category...]

He is a gracious and ecumenical legislator, not a combative one. When you ask him to mention authors he likes, he mentions C.S. Lewis and Jeff Shaara, not political polemicists. [ed.-- Good work getting the Narnia thing out of him, David; but what types of magazines you suppose he prefers to peruse in the shitter? Cmon David -- earn that journalism salary, like Katie did!]

The first person who told me I had to write a column about Thune was a liberal Democratic senator who really likes the guy.

Sounds like it's a contagious tingle, David. Up the leg and all? (But thanks for answering my longstanding question about the Times column fodder: where do they come up with this stuff?)

Anyways boys and girls, remember you heard it today from that man with his finger on the national pulse David Brooks:
Bob McDonnell and John Thune are the new faces (tanned, in a prairie-sun sort of way) of the Republican party. And in compiling this extensive analysis, Mr. Brooks thinks voters will continue in future elections to choose their presidents like they do their boyfriends.

Damn shame it takes a woman has to set him straight on that... What a well-paid joke he's become.

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ADDED: In the "give me a man just like Sarah!" category, Mr. Brooks forgets to mention that Thune too is a committed evangelical Christian. With two daughters.

Myself? I'm thinking of holding out for a president who has raised a son to manhood. Call it sexist all you like, but in some fathers' minds, there might just be this assumption that for a daughter, you teach her to be nice and she'll be taken care of. America needs to return to the do'ers, the ones who act on our own behalf, even if it means setting more modest goals to accomplish -- a short burst of energy. Like lifting, growing your muscles.

Get in, get the job done, get out.

None of these endurance contests that eventually make you forget what it was you were jumping in to quickly accomplish. More real respect for the role of the military. Leave the security and peacekeeping chores to the private interests, instead of contracting them out under the guise of the U.S. military -- the PR damage in foreign lands, with citizens confusing U.S. soldiers with paid contractors will hurt us in years to come, no doubt.

Got to keep control, not just give it away so folks'll like ya. (That never works in terms of respect.)

Maybe without sons to think of, our national priorities have been skewed under Clinton, Bush II, and now Obama. Be nice, and passively let others make the big decisions (corporations, foreign countries -- allies and enemies). You can always "marry" your way into the banquet, as the Clinton daughter did in becoming a successful hedge fund manager, even as the economy her father helped tout crumbles in her country.

I'm sure the Obama girls, like the Bush twins, will be successful too -- the cream of the crop rising to the top, even if America as a whole is a much lessened country thanks to foreign compromises and lobbied regulations. You can kinda avoid that, "independence first, make it on your own merits" scoring system that masculinity so often teaches, if you're just raising daughters content to play protected within a set system where merit and results don't matter because nobody's keeping score.

Of course, not everyone raises their daughters like this, but the higher echelons of American society seem to value protecting women from collective realities, much as they often insulate their softer sons by trading independence for safety. Why teach them how to play the game honestly, how to compete against well-matched others, if we can just sock away enough largess today to keep them safely above the rest of society -- able to hire out for their immediate needs? They can always be lawyers and hedgefund managers, manipulating the system for their own ends to keep meritorious victories minimalized and limit the results of honest hard work.

If you've never tasted independence or the pride in a job well done, I imagine you don't miss it much.