Brooks: Obama Doesn't Pass the Applebee's Test

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Forget beer. This morning on MSNBC, David Brooks created the "Who would you like to share an Awesome Blossom Onion with" meme:

"Obama's problem is he doesn't seem like the kind of guy who can go into an Applebee's salad bar and people think he fits in naturally there."

PSSST! HEY! DAVID! Come close. Um...Applebees doesn't have salad bars. If you're going to use this as a vehicle to test someone's folksiness, at least know what the hell you're talking about. Okay, bud?

Again, I don't want my president eating at Applebees. I don't want my president to have a beer with me. I want my president to have the biggest brains, be the most elite and have the least desire to have a beer at Applebees as possible.

Eugene Robinson on MSNBC just now: "I tend to take this sociology a little more seriously when it's delivered by people who actually eat at Applebees more than once in a decade."

Comments

[Neville]

Obama should take this and run with it. We've had the guy that most people wanted to have a beer with running the country and he's run it into the ground. Now let's get a guy that actually is smart enough to run the country and let McCain sit a Applebees and eat salad and drink beer with Bush.

[cage free brown]

David Brooks doesn't pass the "can tell shit from shinola" test and hasn't for some time now.

[Tom Joad]

It's time HONEST folk everywhere quash this bullshit argument. It's moronic. It is self-destructive. We have lost all respect for brains, integrity, the fact that SOME people ARE smarter than average, and that is what keeps our society working. It isn't the dull-witted.

But also, next time anyone says something like that in your presence, reply "REALLY? You really think George Bush is a "normal" person? He's the GOLD standard for "common man" cause he talks with a fake texan accent? How many regular guys go walking hand in hand through the daisies with oil sheiks?

[Helena Montana]

That is one of the most vapid, inane things I've ever heard Brooks say, and that's saying a lot.

[TK]

McCain's problem is he seems like the kind of guy who frequent at Dennys's, and blend in sooooo well.

[Tom Joad]

Heh...yeah. Mc Cain is the guy all alone over in the corner ranting at the waitress, waving his arms around, demanding a refund and complaining they don't fill his coffee cup up enough.

[Limbaugh's Pilonidal Cyst]

Actually, I think McCain's more the "Old Country Buffet" kind of guy.

[Alex, Indianapolis]

"doesn't seem like the kind of guy who can go into an Applebee's salad bar and people think he fits in naturally there."

Is that because they're racists, perhaps?

[steve duncan]

C'mon, if we're concerned about our Prez being a guy-next-door type of dude there's better tests. Would he be the kind of guy to have one too many, hit on your sister, get into a fight with her husband over it, end up in the slammer for the evening after breaking three knuckles on two different faces, show up for his bail hearing with vomit in his hair and a busted lip needing 5 stitches? That's the kinda means test I want to have him pass!

[bobo no mo']

"bobo" brook's problem is he couldn't go into an men's room and people think he fits in naturally there ...

[Grand Moff Texan]

Uh, isn't Brooks the guy who said that elitist Obama should go to a factory or something, days after Obama actually did?

Why, yes! Yes he was.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200802170002

David Brooks should visit earth, occasionally, if he is going to continue being published here.
.

[Grand Moff Texan]

Uh, isn't Brooks the guy who said that elitist Obama should go to a factory or something, days after Obama actually did?

Why, yes! Yes he was.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200802170002

David Brooks should visit earth, occasionally, if he is going to continue being published here.
.

[nyarlathotep the crawling chaos]

With Bobo Brooks and Kristol Meth at the NYT Opinionator, the paper has become to rancid to even use as cat-box liner.

[Frankie Machine]

I don't want Obama eating at Applebee's either.
He'd constantly be in the bathroom. I want my president out there battling terrorism, not gastric distress.

[NSA/FBI's Watching, Everywhere]

Never been to this site before, but I appreciate the perspective.

I read the NYTimes online a lot, but I refuse to click to Brooks' columns. Hence, thanks for reading same for me.

I'm an old hippie who's still a lefty a la Marx and Jesus and Alan Watts, but in pursuit of intellectual interests, I've read lots of conservative tomes, from Burke to Kirk, etc. I can't bring myself to read pure crap like the NYT op-ed contributors other than Krugman and Herbert. Fuck Kristof, Collins, Dowd, Brooks. What idiots...

[jonwash]

When Mr Brooks turns his column over to Larry the Cable guy then I will take serious his notions about how much importance he places on the common man notions he is espousing!!!

[Elwood, Chicago]

I actually had a beer with Obama one time at a fundraiser, back when he was just a state legislator. He struck me as a friendly, engaging, thoughtful guy. For what it's worth he was drinking a Bud Light. What an elitist!

[pseudobama]

If elected President, I promise you a salad bar in every Applebees!

[Zimzone]

Brooks pretends to be a journalist, but now wants to be a political analyst? Give me a break.
Brooks, like Kristol Meth Billy Boy, couldn't buy a clue, let alone share a welcome opinion.
I quit reading the NYT the day Kristol Meth appeared. And, like Brooks, has had as many fact corrections as posted articles.

[Zimzone]

Brooks pretends to be a journalist, but now wants to be a political analyst? Give me a break.
Brooks, like Kristol Meth Billy Boy, couldn't buy a clue, let alone share a welcome opinion.
I quit reading the NYT the day Kristol Meth appeared. And, like Brooks, has had as many fact corrections as posted articles.

[Zimzone]

Brooks pretends to be a journalist, but now wants to be a political analyst? Give me a break.
Brooks, like Kristol Meth Billy Boy, couldn't buy a clue, let alone share a welcome opinion.
I quit reading the NYT the day Kristol Meth appeared. And, like Brooks, has had as many fact corrections as posted articles.

[Bobo The Hobo]

If that wasn't a salad bar at Applebee's it must have been the dumspter out back.

Mmmm.... Endive, arugula and raddichio

[BO08]

All these comments are on point AND hilarious. Good work!

[Chima]

What the hell is wrong with these media elites? They are so out of touch, it's sickening. Devid Brooks, talking about regular folks? How many regular people does HE know? When last did he even venture out of his limo into an Applebee's? I love how these media elites try to paint Obama (who just managed to pay off his student loans) as out of touch, while THEY are the ones who are clueless. This is the same David Brooks who a few months ago said that Chelsea Clinton has had a hard and difficult life. The same Chelsea Clinton who has lived in the Arkansas governor's mansion and the White House and is earning $800,000 a year on Wall Street?

Good Lawd.

[Plan 9]

David Brooks, once again loyally pushing GOP talking points. This is what he does best, pretending to be a "thoughtful" conservative, but becoming a political hack whenever the party needs him. The current Rethug meme to be pushed: Obama is an "elitist" who "doesn't understand the concerns of everyday Americans." Like Brooks (or, say, George Will) does? Please.