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 ...
Pretty funny headline coming from a so-called conservative who spends his days with his lips affixed to the elite's arses.
Meritocracy?
Today it’s anything BUT merit. It is gender, race connection and every other corruption one can imagine.
Mr Brooks is a case n point.
He ain’t no conservative, but is always highlighted as such by the rags. He should have been passed over years agao.
bottom line.............
“There ain’t no ticks like poly-ticks. Bloodsuckers all.”
-Davy Crockett (unsourced)
Ref
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Davy_Crockett
Interesting bit of self-psychoanalysis performed by Mr. Brooks. (who, btw, writes like a college student)
Because they are self-absorbed and boring, David, just like your article.
Horse flop. In business - yes - people are in fact much more likely to succeed due to effort and performance. But our Elites largely do not come from the ranks of businessmen and women - they come from interconnected families whose members have worked in government for several generations, who all attend the same handful of universities (where last names and endowments matter more than grades), and who obtain employment based upon the access such connections afford.
Short summation:
Character counts
We’ve been saying this for many years, and the media elite (including Brooks) have been telling us we’re crazy — “Clinton is brilliant! Obama is awesome!”
Virtue matters, and the Left has none.
I have no doubt one of the things hidden away in obumblers transcripts is his total lack of comprehension of mathematics.
Ignoring that this explanation of the state of our elites comes from one of the said elite, I have to ask: is Brooks this dumb or just naive? Or both?
To test this theory, call Jesse Jackson Jr.'s office and ask when he will be returning to work.
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
The difference in the 19th century the “elite” mostly left the 99% alone to live their lives as they saw fit.
Today they want to control how much pop we drink.
The problem isn’t that there is a small elite or how people get into that group. The problem is the elite is try to enslave us all. This is new since 50 years ago.
Weve been saying this for many years, and the media elite (including Brooks) have been telling us were crazy Clinton is brilliant! Obama is awesome!
Yep!
I've been saying it since 1998.
Fixed it...
His thesis is that the elites of our day don't recognize themselves as such. He's not denying that the ruling class exists. What he's saying is that they don't recognize themselves as such. Rather than being disingenous, they sincerely deny that they're anything of the sort.
He's credible on this point because he hobnobs with them, so he knows what they're really like. Sure, his worldview can be charitably described as restricted. But, this subject is one of those areas he knows about because he sees them on a day-to-day basis. An analogy: a CEO may be a mercantilist jerkwad in politics, but the same person is going to be knowledgable about management issues.
His point is that the "non-elite" elites duck out of the responsibilities that elites have traditionally assumed. Although sincere in their protestations, today's ruling class have the advantage of denying responsibility for their blunders because they think the other guy is the "real" elite (and therefore should be held accountable.)
Had the ruling class been a real elite, they would have cultivated a sense of honor and sacrifice that would make them more accountable for their actions. It's a Tory argument at heart: if society must have elites, better that they cultivate a sense of social responsibility which would keep them from screwing things up and blowing off responsibility for it.
However...I'm begging the question, as does Brooks himself by conflating dislike of the ruling class with Jacobinical leftistm. Would American society be better without a ruling class? If "yes," then what he wrote is little more than an unconvincing think-piece.
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