When I was in high school, there was a boy in my class who considered me either a rival or a dunce, I still don’t know which, but I was one of the strivers, whereas he had already arrived. He enjoyed putting me down whenever the occasion arose. At one point I made a rather dumb remark that he never let me live down. It is one that reminds me of Republicans, since that party’s “renaissance” in the 1980s.
To paraphrase it, they think because they did some serious reading once upon a time that they can be regarded as intellectuals. The problem is that they mostly misread the authors upon whom they base their authority, such as Adam Smith and Von Hayek. They take convenient quotes out of context from the Reader’s Digest Condensed Books version because all they need are a few choice words to put in their fund raising letters. As those with little knowledge are wont, they cling tenaciously to their extracted texts because they haven’t the benefit of insight from which to evolve their own ideas within the changing economic context.
At any rate, it sounds like you would agree with consultant Michael Murphy, “Obama is the people’s second choice, but Romney is the third.”
A little more recognition of “we” and “us” would help. But then that might involve putting some money where their mouths are, and paying their workers a higher wage, and themselves a little less. Ouch!
http://bonalibro.us
via Party of Strivers – NYTimes.com.