Noemie Emery on David Brooks and the "Educated Class"

Noemie Emery writes in The Washington Examiner:

David Brooks notes that in the last year, something dire has happened: The public has turned decisively against the "educated classes" and all of their works. At the same time, it has also moved against Barack Obama, who began his term with approval ratings that bumped up against 70, and have now sunk to the high to mid-40s, with "strongly disapprove" ratings that rival those of George W. Bush at his worst.

It has also moved strongly against his -- and the educated classes' -- ideas. It is more pro-life, more anti-climate change, more free market, less statist, more inclined to favor "harsh" measures against terrorism suspects, more in favor of "waterboarding" the terrorist [ED.: Unfortunately, I think the majority of the public has always looked the other way on torturing terrorism suspects] caught in the brief-bombing effort, more opposed to the closing of Guantanamo Bay.

While the liberal Left controls the White House along with both houses of Congress, the country it governs has moved to the Right. These phenomena are all interrelated: The country is moving Right in reaction to Obama's theories of governance, and Obama and the educated class are one and the same.

He epitomizes that class and was sold by that class to the country, which purchased the product and has come to regret it. It now wants its money returned.

In a sense, Obama has never been more than his education (Columbia, Harvard), which for some people was more than enough. When Brooks met Obama in 2005, the new senator had no experience and no accomplishments, but he was perfectly briefed in the requisite talking points.

[...]

He was hardly alone. People in newsrooms all over the country decided that someone who talked the way they did was the cure for what ailed the country, and are stunned to find out it is not.

[Read more at The Washington Examiner]