What a difference two years make...

Yet 53 years later the “struggle” continues!

Apr 24, 2025

I’m told my St. Sebastian’s yearbook photo lacks a certain hopeful, optimistic, forward-looking aspect. By sophomore year at MassArt my grim face had only grown longer – as had my hair – because, don’t you remember? The End Times were nigh!

Apparently they weren’t quite. However, NOW THEY’RE REALLY HERE!!!!

I’d heard about David Brooks’s Not Normal piece but hadn’t read it in its entirety because I don’t subscribe to the New York Times. Then a friend sent me the link. It was all over the Sunday shows, of course, and a centerpiece on Monday evening’s PBS News Hour where Brooks plays the role of “conservative” to Jonathan Capehart’s progressive. I correctly remembered that Brooks once wrote for Bill Buckley’s National Review, a magazine I subscribed to in my formative years.

The piece reads like typically hysterical David Brooks tripe to me. Dave, we’ve already HAD the “national civic uprising” you’re calling for; scores of participants are still serving lengthy prison terms as a result of nonviolent expression of their displeasure. Do you REALLY want to go there? Are you calling for violence as you repeatedly claim Trump has done?

Brooks argues that American institutions are under assault from “Trumpism” which he characterizes as driven by ego, appetite, and a primal aversion to higher human qualities. He writes, “In one lane they are going after law firms. In another they savaged U.S.A.I.D. In another they’re attacking our universities. On yet another front they’re undermining NATO and on another they’re upending global trade.” All worthy targets, as I see it. I know three St. Sebastian Arrows from the class of ’70 who’ve spent time in Donald Trump’s presence, two of whom have an entirely different opinion of Trump than Brooks does and a third who’d be out of his highly-paid nightly MSNBC gig were it not for his years of vitriol spewed at Trump via his ratings-shedding cable “news” outlet. Brooks, a Democrat in Republican clothing, shows zero understanding of what led us to this point. As a New York Times columnist he personifies the elite mainstream media with his attempts – to diminishing effect – at directing the narrative.

I can’t listen to music when I drive; the rhythm of the tunes conflicts with the rhythm of the road. I DO, however, listen to news and talk radio. The only buttons I have set are the local Fox News Radio affiliate and the local NPR member station. I watch both MSNBC and Fox and I read voraciously. Sorry, but I don’t share the calamitous outlook of DB’s rancid melange. I was hearing those same dire warnings when the two dour portraits above were shot.

I mentioned reading National Review. Years before that I remember sitting in my grandmother’s upstairs TV parlor at 82 Larch Street, a stone’s throw from St. Sebastian’s on the Oak Square, Brighton side, with my father and his two brothers. All three had studied at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and two went on to work at the CIA, including dad. We’d watch Bill Buckley’s Firing Line on WGBH, channel 2 in Boston, and the Sunday morning interview panels on the networks. Doing the math I would have been no older than eight when I began to take notice. I’ve been steeped in this stuff from an early age.

Befitting my hippie appearance in the righthand photograph I dutifully cast my first Presidential vote for George McGovern in 1972. The next day, leaving class and walking inbound on Brookline Avenue toward Fenway Park, I encountered classmate Ron Laffin approaching from the other direction. As we passed he threw his hands up in the air and exclaimed, “We lost!” With a suitably chagrined expression I answered “Yeah!” And immediately wondered, had we? Until then, I’d been conflicted between peer pressure and my father’s letters home as a CIA operative in Southeast Asia. Two memories about my father from my high school years come to mind: first, him flying home from Vietnam to meet with Father Boles, St. Seb’s headmaster, to prevent my younger brother from being expelled and second, him telling me, “Don’t believe a word Walter Cronkite says.” That statement colors my credulity to this day when I read, watch or listen to legacy media.

Ironically, the St. Seb’s friend who sent me the Brooks piece, last I heard, had sworn off watching the news or following current events. He and his wife told me that avoiding those sources of angst made their lives far more serene. At their suggestion, I tried to follow their example but gave up after three months when I found abstinence produced the opposite effect on my psyche.

So, you can buy the hype or not, your choice. But, PLEASE, read, watch, listen, dig deep, research! Poke your head out of the silo! It probably won’t get chopped off and even if it does it’ll only hurt for a second! Suggested sources to start with:

Musical Interlude:

MD Streeter

Apr 25

I'm of a slightly newer generation and I remember much of the same "the sky is falling!" hysteria during the Bush II years when I was in college. It is certainly amplified for Trump, though. The only people who think Brooks is a righty are lefties.

Killer sideburns in that first pic, by the way.

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1 reply by PJ King