Is There are a Barack Obama-David Brooks Bromance?

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“A bromance or ‘man-crush’ is a close but non-sexual relationship between two men, a form of homosocial intimacy. “–Wikipedia

Check out Gabriel Sherman’s essay “The Courtship: The Story Behind the Obama-Brooks Bromance” on The New Republic website. Brooks is a conservative columnist that even liberals can love. Though he is often critical of the Obama administration, he seems to have fallen head-over-heels for a president who can go toe to toe with him on the intricacies of political philosophy.

Sherman does not mention this in his article, but you may remember that Brooks was the first reporter to call attention to Obama’s fascination with Reinhold Niebuhr. (Brooks and E.J. Dionne recently discussed Obama and Niebuhr with Krista Tippett, the host of American Public Media’s “Speaking of Faith.”). Though Niebuhr would not have recognized the term “bromance,” he was clearly the cupid who brought the columnist and the president together.

Brooks’s Obama-love is not lost on the president or his staff. As Sherman points out, a pro-administration column from Brooks provides proof that Obama is “fundamentally post-partisan.” David Axelrod even comes to meetings with Brooks carrying a copy of Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France. Meanwhile Brooks has said: “I used to think conservatives were right about the big things–the Soviet Union, economic growth…Now, on a lot of issues, I think liberals have been right about some big things, like rising inequality….”

Three cheers for the independent thinking of conservative David Brooks.

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  1. Paul Harvey says

    Based on his rather scathing last editorial, which basically accused Obama of caving in to the “Huffington Post” crowd, I think a break-up and some hurtie feelings might be in the offing.

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