Over time and in different places, they have been known by a myriad of names. But their function is always the same. They protect, guide, plan, reward and punish. Their family name – and in the rarest of cases, their own accomplishments – give them the presumption of leadership in a wider sphere. We know them as the elites.
For generation after generation they have provided leadership. Well-educated, well-spoken, well-connected, they have piloted the ship of state across the ocean of time. They worked deals, arranged compromises, ignored nonsense and provided the vision that the rest of us bought into. Their shared values created cohesion; together we moved forward as a nation.
Their cost was minimal. A posting as ambassador to a nation where one could do little harm. An upscale business title, respectable salary, with few duties in a friendly firm that needed the occasional ear in the corridors of government. Perhaps a prestigious academic posting where graduate students did the research and teaching. The ever-present option of government service, a military appointment and a pension. Finally, there was the world of private foundations and nonprofits.
Self-sacrifice, while never high on the elites' job description, was always present. When connections and compromise failed, principle emerged; the family honor demanded it. War was not unknown; and once the conflict was under way, the elites shed their blood along with the rest of the nation.
Today, it is difficult to imagine that happening. One sees glimpses of it, as in recent headlines that Britain's Prince Harry would be posted to Iraq. But he quickly faded from view, and the announcement was withdrawn. One finds it difficult to imagine, say, Ted Kennedy sacrificing anything for our nation – not even when his supposed principles are involved, as with his strident efforts to kill a wind farm to generate electricity five miles over the horizon from his Nantucket Sound vacation mansion.
Carried to its modern-day extreme, we are presented with the picture of Hillary Clinton: a power-hungry, incompetent and unprincipled woman driven to adopt positions from one political extreme to the other as she fleshes out her public persona in search of a few kind words of acceptance from her disparate voting blocs. (And yes, former presidents and first ladies do occupy the outer fringes of the circle of elites in our nation.)
The elites trash the middle-class values of marriage and personal responsibility in their speeches, writings and cocktail hour gossip in an effort to garner praise from the perverts in the media and special interest groups, which run today's newsrooms. All the while, closeted in their members-only enclaves, the elites embrace for themselves the values they trash in public, passing them onto their children. The vulnerable and helpless in our culture believe and act upon the elites' public pronouncements, leading to personal destruction and widening a sinkhole from which our society cannot free itself. The families of the elites grow up intact and prosperous; those who believed their words but could not see their actions suffer destruction. The elites answer is always the same: raise taxes on the middle class, give more handouts to the poor, and somehow make it all "fair." While we get our cut, of course.
As for as the elites' international problem-solving abilities, forget it. Their education consists of indoctrination by the 1960s radicals who – having occupied the college campus administration buildings during their anti-war protests – somehow never left. History and religion, two topics that are crucial to understanding the world, are either falsified to where their mothers wouldn't recognize them or banned entirely from the ivory tower.
The elites' answers to the world's problems are always the same: denigrate, delay and deny. Terrorism? No, 9-11 was a single, isolated incident. Islam is an inherently peaceable religion. It's Israel's intransigence that is the problem, you see. The Jews and the Christians – now there's the ticket. Get rid of them and you solve the world's problems with Islam. That is the way to peace and prosperity in a free and democratic world. At least, for the elites.
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