Readers of this blog know that David Brooks is one of my favorite columnists. His latest column was a gem, though I do have quibbles.Brooks worries that the Obama Administration is moving too fast, that it is falling into a trap to which liberals are more susceptible. He characterizes Obama's bold plans as government designed "top-down transformational change" and argues that if it "mostly" works, "the epistemological scepticism natural to conservatives will have been discredited." If it "mostly" fails, "then liberalism will suffer a grievous blow and conservatives will be called on to restore order and sanity." Never mind the obvious reality that it was conservative reliance on old ideas that got us into this mess, that's not actually my quibble here.
The problem is that Brooks' language (despite his conspicuous use of "mostly")oversimplifies things and rings of cynicism instead of the much more laudable scepticism about which he writes. He makes it seem as though we can only have one or the other, epistemological scepticism OR experimentation, and that the Obama plan represents the latter. Sceptical(or critical)experimentation, not to be confused with splitting the baby in two, is what all sides are really after.
It's a small quibble about a thoughtful essay that spells out for readers the yin and yang of liberal and conservative thinking, both of which serve valuable functions in our intellectual and political life.