Newspaper Reader

stephenkmacksd.com/

Nov 21, 2025

Editor: Since his ascedancy via his ‘The Collapse of the Dream Palaces’ David Brooks has self- presented as a Public Moralist, while acting an apologist/advocate via his wan protagonist Joey Tabal Rasa, as the central actor of his advoacacy for the The Iraq War. Note Mr. Brooks total disdaine of the questions raised by Jeffrey Epstein, and his political/social/mobility within the the Elites, of a not too distant past! Here Brooks acts a later day Cotton Mather, on his Pulpit in The New York Times.

Never before have I been so uncertain about the future. Think of all the giant issues that confront us: artificial intelligence, potential financial bubbles, the decline of democracy, the rise of global authoritarianism, the collapse of reading scores and general literacy, China’s sudden scientific and technological dominance, Russian advances in Ukraine. … I could go on and on. So what has America’s political class decided to obsess about over the last several months?

Jeffrey Epstein.

This is a guy who has been dead for six years and who last was in touch with Donald Trump 21 years ago, Trump has said.

Why is Epstein the top issue in American life right now? Well, in an age in which more and more people get their news from short videos, if you’re in politics, the media or online, it pays to focus on topics that are salacious, are easy to understand and allow you to offer self-confident opinions with no actual knowledge.

But the most important reason the Epstein story tops our national agenda is that the QAnon mentality has taken over America. The QAnon mentality is based on the assumption that the American elite is totally evil and that American institutions are totally corrupt. If there is a pizzeria on Connecticut Avenue in Northwest, D.C., it must be because Hillary Clinton is running a child abuse sex ring in the basement.

The Epstein case is precious to the QAnon types because here, in fact, was a part of the American elite that really was running a sex abuse ring. So, of course, they leap to the conclusion that Epstein was a typical member of the American establishment, not an outlier. It’s grooming and sex trafficking all the way down. (A previous generation of John Birch Society conspiracists were not content to claim Alger Hiss was a communist spy, which he was. They also had to insist that President Dwight Eisenhower was a paid Soviet agent.)

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Editor: The final paragraphs of Brook’s diatribe are utterly indicative of his relation to Cotton Mather! As not just scolding, but of defamation about ‘the other’ as not just undesirerable, but that must be eliminated with urgency: though Brooks does not place Women as the carriers of the toxin! Reader the prevaling tone of Brooks’ essay reeks of a Pulpit of another time and place !

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These are genuine challenges. If I were a Democratic politician, I might try telling the truth, which in my version would go something like this: The elites didn’t betray you, but they did ignore you. They didn’t mean to harm you. But they didn’t see you in the 1970s as deindustrialization took your jobs; in the ensuing decades as your families and communities broke apart; during all those decades when high immigration levels made you feel like a stranger in your own land.

But over the last decade you have made yourself seen. Now the question is: Who is actually going to work with you on your problems? Which party is actually going to help you improve your health outcomes or your kids’ educational outcomes? Which party is actually going to help you achieve the American dream? Will Trump’s war on scientific research or any of the other stuff he’s doing actually do anything to help American workers?

If I were a Democratic politician (this role-playing is kind of fun) I’d add that America can’t get itself back on track if the culture is awash in distrust, cynicism, catastrophizing lies and conspiracymongering. No governing majority will ever form if we’re locked in a permanent class war.

I’d try to recognize that no political moment is forever. Right now, the dark passions are ascendant. But after one cultural moment, voters tend to hunger for its opposite, which in this case means leaders who project integrity, unity, honesty and hope.

The smart play, I’d say, is to rebut conspiracymongering, not abet it. When the giant issues like A.I. and Chinese dominance come crashing down on us, we will look back on the Epstein moment and ask: “What the hell were we thinking?”

Newspaper Reader.