Posted on 07/13/2012 5:07:13 AM PDT by C19fan
Through most of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Protestant Establishment sat atop the American power structure. A relatively small network of white Protestant men dominated the universities, the world of finance, the local country clubs and even high government service. Over the past halfcentury, a more diverse and meritocratic elite has replaced the Protestant Establishment. People are more likely to rise on the basis of grades, test scores, effort and performance.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
A life member of the gop/e tries to paint himself as one of us... NO SALE!
LLS
“And for the first time in the history of the nation, there is not a Protestant on the Supreme Court. Not one.
Wow, I was beginning to think no one else was connecting the dots. Very astute observation
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Very interesting. Can you please elaborate on what the picture looks like with the dots connected? And who drew those dots? Not being sarcastic or antagonistic - I’d really like to know.
Besides Ginsberg, are all the rest Catholic? Any avowed atheists?
With the dots connected, can you posit a plausible theory that would explain why a series of Protestant Presidents (except Muslim Obama, of course) would go out of their way consciously to appoint non-Protestants?
Thanks.
Todays elite is more talented and open but lacks a self-conscious leadership code. The language of meritocracy (how to succeed) has eclipsed the language of morality (how to be virtuous).
David Brooks is close to understanding. Doesn't it seem strange countries run by 'kings and queens' (even though many are personally borderline incompetent) - tend to create more stable societies?
You first have to ask why did we come here in the first place? What were our ancestors escaping? What was raging in Europe at the time for a people to cry out for freedom. Freedom from what?
Actually, more like 100 years ago, with the ascendancy of Woodrow Wilson.
Read some of the material that Wilson had written as a big name political science professor at Princeton and you can see his big government biases - and disdain for the Constitution - before he became President.
Character counts
Too many voters have been trained by pop culture and the entertainment brokers to chose style over substance.
As much to point, I believe this is the first time in our history where every member of the SCOTUS went to law school at either Harvard or Yale. (Ginsburg graduated from Columbia Law after two years at Harvard Law.)
Imagine that: of all the law schools in the country, only the two most elitist Ivy League schools have been deemed capable of producing "la creme de la creme"!!!
There was a time when geographical diversity was a consideration in SCOTUS appointments. No more, apparently.
Sigh, has it been 100 years? It seems just like yesterday Woodrow was elected.
Education =? Indoctrination
(My son-in-law is a Harvard Law Grad, corporate attorney & Conservative)
Yes, 100 years ago today (1912), ol' Woody would have been campaigning for the presidency to which he was elected that November. BTW, Theodore Roosevelt, the third party "Progressive" candidate in that race, wasn't too far behind Wilson in his big government predilections by that time.
Never the less it is the times we are living in, Laodicea and all
Brooks may be right, except for those benefited by Affirmative Action!!!
Let me suggest a better term, "pretentious air-heads" suffering from the spreading contagion from the Cloud Dancing antics of the far Left.
Any student of the history of American public discourse, political campaigns, journalism, etc., will realize that there has been a virtual collapse of analytic quality--it is the difference between the understanding of a Jefferson, the reasoned discourse of men like Webster & Calhoun & their entire generation, and the 30 second sound bite.
I do not know why Brooks considers his subject malodorous, but his term "elites," must surely be tongue-in-cheek. (And while I have a weakness for using hackneyed cliches that convey my meaning, I will assure you that I am still more than adequate to handle any of those "elites" in a debate over political direction. The 30 second sound bite is scarcely at what would have been the equivalent of the third grade level in antebellum America.
Cheers!
William Flax
And, the takeover of academia by the left allowed them to decide who excelled in grades, test scores and performance. They were the judges of those things. Education became indoctrination.
Dave, I can think of some situations in which that could be considered a distinction without a difference.
Classical education, as in Plato and Aristotle? A lot of political philosophy and psychology there, no?
The lack of science and math (hard subjects) means they have mushy thinking and can't tell hard facts from half-truths.
Plato and other Greeks praised the clarity of mathematics. That still didn't prevent them from believing some strange things.
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