Friday, August 13, 2010

Victor Davis Hanson and The Two Americas





That over paid lawyer/vp candidate was right. There are two Americas. And somehow I think he and I will never be in the same America. Here's further explanation of the bifurcation from a NRO piece by Victor Davis Hanson. I recommend reading the whole thing but her are a couple of choice quotes.


Yesterday, the New York Times had a puff piece on the “exhausting” nature of White House work, pegged to the recent wave of administration departures. The list of grievances: the grueling 12-hour days, the burden of dealing with an inherited recession, two wars, etc. Of course, in the weeks after 9/11, administration employees had to develop an entire protocol to prevent serial terrorist assaults in the wake of the most successful attack on the continental United States in the nation’s history. I don’t recall profiles of Bush people who were “exhausted” dealing with the partisanship and pressures.
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Does this serial complaining come from the top, or is it simply characteristic of the urban technocratic class? . . . but landing a job as CEO of a multi-million-dollar publishing company must be some consolation.
The Times wants to draw a sympathetic portrait of the heroic Obama cadre that suffers so much on our behalf. These are six-figure jobs that wear out one’s hands on the Blackberry, true, but serve as valuable stepping-stones to even higher-paying corporate jobs. And this is still a recession. This raise-the-bar griping will not go down well with the coal worker in Montana, the welder on a 30-story scaffold, or the oil worker offshore (e.g., it is not as if a Blackberry is going to blow up in one’s hands, or an acoustical tile is going to fall and crush one in the West Wing). It is all too reminiscent of the various explanations we’ve heard for why Michelle’s Costa del Sol sojourn was an understandable and much-needed refresher before the more arduous odyssey ahead on Martha’s Vineyard.

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