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Well, give Brooks credit: The op-ed is the epitome of Zeitgeist-obsessed, generationally driven, faux-sociological punditry, with a dash of economic determinism for spice.
Meaning you can quibble over this until the cows come home. Conservatism may be in disarray, but its era may have ended the moment George W. Bush invaded Iraq. (Besides, didn't we hear all this generational chatter after Sept. 11?) And this obsession with baby boomers, with glibly named generations of any kind, as an explanation for all things, has long bordered on the inane, despite its promiscuity in the media. OK, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were baby boomers. But Clinton, for all his personal failings, created a surplus and lots of jobs. True, he didn't defeat the business cycle and the dot-com bubble burst as he was leaving, but since when are economic cycles particular to boomers? As for Bush, well, it's hard to see anything that worked very well; and many of his key people -- Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld -- were not baby boomers at all. Perhaps the most arguable trend Brooks tosses out is the notion that because Barack Obama is highly educated, lived for years near universities and is supported heavily by a professional crowd (including the media), then a new upscale "ruling class" is at hand. Is Brooks suggesting the government is currently led by Joe the Plumbers? That it's not full of folks who attended fancy schools? That Obama won't receive the votes of millions of middle-class Americans? That Bill Ayres is going to be treasury secretary? All that's nitpicking -- albeit enjoyable. What's more interesting to toss around is Brooks' notion that the Long Boom is over and we're about to enter "an age of scarcity" that Obama (and Brooks is pretty sure he's winning) and his post-boomer generation are particularly ill-equipped to handle. Now everyone is scared to death, and Great Depression references are swirling around like snowflakes. But if this episode in economic history tells us anything, it's that despite this apparently momentous episode, we have no idea where we're going. Odds are, of course, that the next year could be ugly. But are we looking at a prolonged period of subpar, even negative, economic growth? Are we looking at a recession or a depression? Besides, we heard how the Long Boom was dead after the dot-coms crashed and after Sept. 11. Is what we're suffering through analogous to the '30s, the '70s, the Japanese deflation, the Asia Crisis or, God forbid for pundits, is it unique, incomparable? Much of this will depend on the confluence of factors that didn't exist, say, 50 years ago. And much will depend on choices already made and on decisions that will be made, at home and abroad, in years ahead. Will scarcity be a factor? Certainly, much as it was in the first Clinton term, when many of his domestic ambitions were tossed out in order to regain some fiscal sanity. It's not as if Obama's focus on middle-class relief and universal healthcare was not a response to already evident scarcities. Brooks, however, seems to believe that we are in for a long period of deep chill, which would suggest a substantially deleveraged financial system that restricts credit of all kind. He may be right or he may be wrong; Americans of all generations share a powerful consumer culture that they will be loath to abandon, which means there's always a bias to accommodation, efficiency and leverage in the system. But Brooks also implies that a new administration will be rigidly determined by the dynamics of a down cycle, that the economy will inevitably shrink as the population ages, and that the many levers and wheels possessed by the federal government will no longer respond. Thus, the Long Boom resulted from some mysterious release of animal spirits, and the Long Bust will be prolonged by a concomitant despiritualization. In other words, Barack Obama is Jimmy Carter. The Zeitgeist rules. Beneath Brooks' discussion of the Long Boom lurks Ronald Reagan, who by Brooks' dating fathered it -- though the Federal Reserve's Paul Volcker (and Obama's nonboomer economic adviser) deserves as much of the credit for raising interest rates to kill the inflationary beast. (And Volcker began his rate hikes under Carter, helping to insure that the Georgian lost the election to Reagan.) Trends and cycles are like clichés: There are kernels of hard truth there. Yes, a degree of determinism -- based on generations, economic cycles, maybe sunspots. But just a degree. Outside the deterministic circumference roams free will. Maybe millions of Americans are crazy, but when they vote today, they're voting for free will. - Robert Teitelman See the op-ed from The New York Times Robert Teitelman is the editor in chief of The Deal. CategoriesComments Deal Video
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This being election day, David Brooks in The New York Times revs up his trend-o-matic machine to a fever pitch. The election, he says, marks the end of an economic era (the Long Boom beginning in 1983), a political era (Reagan conservatism) and a generational era (the dominance of the baby boomers). 
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Relevantly, as many influential experts and publications have repeatedly pointed out, Obama is part of Generation Jones, born 1954-1965, between the Boomers and Xers.
Here's a recent 5 minute GenJones video which features many top pundits (including david brooks) specifically talking about Obama's membership in Generation Jones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ta_Du5K0jk