Trump is great and he deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.

The purpose of life is to create. Human creativity gives meaning to our lives.

AI will break our spirit even more since it has been trained to replace creative work as a part of some of the first attempts to monetize the new technology.

I generally think David Brooks is pretty thoughtful. But what he seems to be lamenting is the loss of a caste system - a society where everyone knows their role and can excel in it and be valued for their contribution to the greater good. There's a meaning to life in that construct. The Enlightenment changes that with its focus on reason and individual happiness, which is pretty much the foundation of western civilization.

I'm not sure how Trump features in this. In many ways he's an autocrat who believes in a command economy that the government controls. Among Republicans today, their preference is for a government that chooses winners and losers. And it's fealty to Trump that decides who wins and who loses. There's no good here. But there is a yearning to be a part of something larger than the individual. And so we have a red team or blue team America. Which is unsatisfying for everyone. But there is a genuine yearning in most humans to be a part of something larger - and reason and the pursuit of individual happiness doesn't hit that space. Republicans have chosen a cult of the individual and a command economy. And Democrats don't know what the hell they're doing and offer no vision whatsoever. So the gravitational pull is going to be toward the red team, which at least offers some meaning and purpose - terrible as it might be. Whereas Democrats offer only nothingness and banalities.

Trump is not a good businessman. He doesn’t run a family business, he runs a crime organization.

Extortion, tax evasion, and suing people instead of paying them is not “good business.”

I'm just scratching my head at why anyone thinks Trump is a good businessman or builder. He built that wretched tower in Chicago and Trump Tower 55 years ago. Everything else was a reno job. And he didn't do a good job.

The guy can run a boutique hotel and a nice--but money-losing--golf course. That's it.

It was a good discussion on what the ideal of the future would be after Trump but it only had a couple of sentences on why people thought Trump was good.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone share a gift link? Looks interesting: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/trump-administration-supporters-good/683441/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLcdT5leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHuoxrizqUO-T4KYALwnf2-gn0Isakt-vB8kaMXq9QkU_dv0R9e9gJVHtX0j5_aem_i9c-LRWAM-s9KyN0lEw3Vg

Fing David Brooks? Who wrote a book on morality while cheating on his wife with his writing assistant?

Of course he hates Trump who doesn't preach morality and beats him in every facet of life

Scratch golfer
Rebuilt Manhattan
Better looking wife
Ivy educated healthy kids
Billionaire
President
Savior of western civilization

Oh exhibit A in the crazy Trump lover. I loathe Brooks, and his whole argument is suspect, but you take the cake.

Fundamentally morality should be about looking out for fellow humans and following the laws we have agree to. Trump breaks promises and contracts constantly, ignores laws he doesn’t agree with, and the only fellows he considers are wealthy people.

He only became truly wealthy because of his recent grifts as President ; no true Billionaire would have been hawking Bibles

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone share a gift link? Looks interesting: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/trump-administration-supporters-good/683441/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLcdT5leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHuoxrizqUO-T4KYALwnf2-gn0Isakt-vB8kaMXq9QkU_dv0R9e9gJVHtX0j5_aem_i9c-LRWAM-s9KyN0lEw3Vg

Fing David Brooks? Who wrote a book on morality while cheating on his wife with his writing assistant?

Of course he hates Trump who doesn't preach morality and beats him in every facet of life

Scratch golfer
Rebuilt Manhattan
Better looking wife
Ivy educated healthy kids
Billionaire
President
Savior of western civilization

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone share a gift link? Looks interesting: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/07/trump-administration-supporters-good/683441/?utm_campaign=the-atlantic&utm_content=edit-promo&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLcdT5leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHuoxrizqUO-T4KYALwnf2-gn0Isakt-vB8kaMXq9QkU_dv0R9e9gJVHtX0j5_aem_i9c-LRWAM-s9KyN0lEw3Vg

Fing David Brooks? Who wrote a book on morality while cheating on his wife with his writing assistant?

Anonymous wrote:A reality tv star is heading NASA. Only in an alternative universe could this be true.

NASA does research. That is not something MAGA values.

He is not heading NASA, he is dismantling it.

https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/09/nasa-staff-departures-00444674

The essay doesn’t really answer the question asked. It sort of dances around it.

Brooks still takes the conversation in an interesting direction. I think he is wrong that pluralism is the answer to the problem he identifies. At the end of the day, the morality and sacrifice of years past stretching into antiquity for the greater good was anchored to something people believed was real: The Glory of Athens or for the Glory of God and sanctification or even for the glory of baseball.

But, either way, all of those are anchored on in-group/out-group constructs. Which are fundamentally incompatible with pluralism. Brooks seems to suggest that he wants people to self-sacrifice for the greater good and be anchored to shared morality, but historically people have needed to believe in a cause greater than themselves for that. Pluralism sweeps away the foundation for belief. If everybody’s moral system is worthy of respect or confined to the private sphere than none can actually be true or be brought to the public sphere.

I agree with Brooks that we are not going back on pluralism and open society. But just as war and violence seems to be the fatal flaw of the moral systems of years past, perhaps the hyper individualism and moral relativism is the fatal flaw of the Enlightenment that cannot be corrected?

A reality tv star is heading NASA. Only in an alternative universe could this be true.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because MAGA is locked inside a media ecosystem that is devoid of facts or reason.

Boo Hoo libs have lost narrative control.

Only with the mouth breathers in our society.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because MAGA is locked inside a media ecosystem that is devoid of facts or reason.

Boo Hoo libs have lost narrative control.

Boo hoo Republicans are ready to let their little white boys be uneducated and work in factories or fields for zero wages or safety and their DD married off under 18 to some old white guy and women to lose the right to her own property or monies . Genius of maga women just genius

Anonymous wrote:Same reason all the left thought Joe was sharp.

No one thought he was sharp. Heck, he hasn't been sharp since 2005. But he cares about the country and generally did the right thing and left the USA in a much better place than he found it. The same was not true of Trump in 2021, nor is i true today.