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America is not just a democracy, it represents a certain culture of competitive mobility and personality aspirations, politics is not merely a clash of interests, but a clash of dreams.

David Brooks

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David Brooks
Age: 63
Born: 1961
Born: August 22
Editor
Journalist
Politician
Pundit
City of Toronto
Dream
Interests
Certain
Merely
America
Personality
Mobility
Dreams
Clash
Democracy
Aspirations
Politics
Represents
Interest
Competitive
Culture
Aspiration

More quotes by David Brooks

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If we're in some sort of Hobbesian state of nature, where you just want a strong man who has no compassion Donald Trump is going to do a little better. So, we will figure out what game we're playing.
David Brooks
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There are no free and democratic and wealthy countries in the world that have US rate of gun violence. We have to worry about loners and alienated people. We have to do better on mental health.
David Brooks
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The technology's going to change, but what people want to read is going to be basically the same.
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As a director, I like trying to unlock the subtext of the scene and try to put the camera in a place that helps that.
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Trump has picked the more extreme versions of all Republicans so far, the more aggressive. And I think the thing to watch out for is, I could totally paint a scenario where Trump runs an authoritarian regime. I can totally paint a scenario where he has no control over his own government.
David Brooks
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I sort of feel we have to owe some respect to the process and owe some respect to the electorate and the people who voted Donald Trump, on the assumption that they have something to teach us.
David Brooks
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If you're running a successful administration, then you're loyal to people who are basically good who make a mistake. And that seems to be essential for any organization. And it should be essential if this were a normal administration, rather than a fiefdom, where everybody simply tries to give Donald Trump a good headline every day.
David Brooks
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Economists sometimes do try to reduce behavior to law-like predictability. But people respond differently to different primes, to different contexts even from one moment to the next. We possess multiple selves that are aroused by different circumstances.
David Brooks
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The gun becomes this psychological totem, this thing of who I am. And it's almost as if using the gun is going to be the thing that's going to be my expression of how I make a difference in the world.
David Brooks
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How can we expect young people to be rooted in things such as character, morality and honesty? How is one supposed to be at once an arrow soaring skyward and an oak planted firmly in the ground? The meritocratic culture hones strivers on every aspect of their lives save one - how to cultivate character.
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Liberals lost touch with working-class Americans because they never had to have a conversation about values with those voters they could just rely on the courts to impose their views.
David Brooks
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I happen to think most people go into government do it for the right reasons and they really do things as they see them on the merits of the issues.
David Brooks
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Civility is the natural state for people who know how limited their own individual powers are and know, too, that they need the conversation.
David Brooks
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People tend to marry people with similar-width noses, eyes similarly apart, with complementary immune systems.
David Brooks
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If you're cutting deals with one company or another, eventually, there's going to be a quid pro quo. There's going to be a bribe. There's going to be something.
David Brooks
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I think Romney's foreign policy is sensible.
David Brooks
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Through American history, we have had populist movements that often, often, often have this ugly racial element. But, often, there are warning signs of some deeper social and economic problem.
David Brooks
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When you talk about the problem of illegal immigration, people are angry and polarized. When you talk about the answers, the debate gets a little different.
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Tim Kaine has been obviously a governor. He's been a senator. He's one of the smartest rising stars in the Democratic Party. He is very plausible as someone who could sit in and be president.
David Brooks
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You figure out, what is the crucial issue facing the country right now? And for Trump, it was that the global economy and the international world order were failing regular people.
David Brooks