“Part of what’s happened is, is that elites in a very mobile, globalized world are able to live together, away from folks who are not as wealthy, and so they feel less of a commitment to making those investments,” he explained during a panel discussion on poverty at Georgetown University today.His own children were unavailable for comment as they were busy with their studies at Sidwell Friends, where the current tuition is surprisingly affordable. But I digress.
Obama criticized the free-market system in America for allowing higher concentrations of wealth to exist among the rich while the bottom percentage was being left behind and receiving a smaller portion of that wealth.
“Those who are doing better and better, more skilled, more educated, – luckier – having greater advantages are withdrawing from the commons,” he said. “Kids start going to private schools, kids start working out at private clubs instead of the public parks, an anti-government ideology then disinvests from those common goods and those things that draw us together.”
Do you see the transition? “Kids start going to private schools, kids start working out at private clubs instead of the public parks, an anti-government ideology then disinvests from those common goods and those things that draw us together.” So where is the "anti-government ideology" coming from, precisely? Is it private school? A private club? And which ones? Does Sidwell Friends preach an anti-government ideology? Closer to home, do Blake or Breck do these dastardly things? C'mon, Mr. President, we need to know the facts. It's tough to be carrying the torches and pitchforks without a roadmap.
7 comments:
What is striking is not Obama's lack of self-awareness and dishonesty, but rather that the MSM is not calling him on it. That's really, really dangerous.
i've said, in different words, the same thing when it comes to immigration policy.
Bush and Clinton and Obama, and all the senators, dont send their kids to the schools that my kids went to and had their education stymied, or their neighborhoods turned into TB infected barrios.
the status quo not only works for them, they cant see how its not working for everybody else.
the status quo not only works for them, they cant see how its not working for everybody else.
I don't think it's that they can't see it, Gino. That's too charitable a view. I think they don't give a shit. The Bushes of the world at least have the decency to maintain a genteel silence about their indifference.
It strikes me as very interesting that the currency received at these elite schools seems to be more connections than intelligence or ability. Probably has something to do with the question of whether it is ignorance, blindness, or malice on the part of our "betters".
And it has everything to do with why their programs don't work. Modest intelligence, even more modest wisdom, and a head the size of Texas acquired at Punahou, Breck, Hahvid, Yale, or the like.
The anti-elitism argument is one that requires caution, Bubba. I wouldn't argue that a Harvard education guarantees that an individual will be a top performer, but it is a marker that, at a crucial but distant point in that person's development, they were able to win the paper chase. Having said that, winning the paper chase is a valuable indicator in certain endeavors. And it certainly helps if you have access to the Harvard old boy network. Opens a lot of doors.
I'm pretty sure I've written about this before, but in my own experience I've had bosses from a wide variety of institutions, including Harvard. My boss from Harvard was a very bright guy and a good guy, too, but there wasn't anything about him that would indicate superiority other than the diploma that was hanging on his office wall. The most intelligent and capable boss I've had in my career was a graduate of Oklahoma State, which most people consider a cow college. He kept his diploma at home, of course.
On the larger point, Obama is actually correct — the elite is largely self-selected and its members do tend to self-segregate in a way that is advantageous to them and detrimental to others. Which brings us to the original point. Obama is very much part of that self-selected elite and it would be better if he wouldn't pretend otherwise. I would also add that it's telling that he made these remarks at Georgetown and not at, say, UW-Platteville.
The best, as in capable, president in our lifetimes was reagan. No harvard guy there...
I've had a supervisor from Harvard as well, and she was great. That noted, it's also worth noting that a lot of our Ivy League "betters" in politics are simply a waste of oxygen. I've yet to see anything profound out of Obama, Clinton (either one), Dayton, or Franken, to put it very mildly. It is as if our country is--especially on the left--selecting for narcissistic personality disorder.
And really, if isolation from the "commons" is the cause, how do we explain Obama and Clinton? How do you spend 20 years on the South Side, or your formative years in the not-so-grand areas of Hot Springs and Hope, without getting a clue this way?
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