Continuing The Conversation There ☝️

Only because I can’t embed a tweet in comments.

This is an awesome clip thank you https://t.co/LwS1SLFaEe

— Jack Cocchiarella (@JDCocchiarella) June 8, 2026

Again, I know nothing about Platner. But he’s not a Bill Clinton Rhodes Scholar or a Barack Obama Ivy League Black man. I mention them because Obama was met with both birtherism and assaults on his UCC pastor in Chicago (Obama threw him under the bus instanter, parting easily two that were never joined). Clinton was greeted with a great deal of suspicion because he was from Arkansas, not the approved regions. But both had credentials and not working class backgrounds, alone. 

Brooks is a snob whose first claim to fame was a piece of faux socialism about the people he imagined fined at Applebees. The problem was, as those people could tell, Brooks had never darkened the door of an Applebees. He was a fake, trying to establish his bons fides with the people who set themselves apart from the people who, they imagine, dine only at Applebees.

And then there’s Platner. Like Talarico, he’s “dangerous.” He might inspire people to be less deferential to the rich. That, at least, seems the best explanation for why David Brooks is so condescending.