The word “elite” usually is used to refer to excellence. An elite military unit is one that is the best trained and equipped. An elite university, like Harvard or Stanford, is one considered better than most. Statistically, the elite are those in the top of the bell curve, being at least in the third standard deviation above the mean or above 95% of the sample population.
Today, the word “elite,” means something very bad to the people on the left politically and to those on the far right.
To the people on the left, the elite are the cause of all problems in the world. Since the Left firmly believes that we were all created equal, it blames the manipulation by the elite to oppress the working class to increase profits and personal wealth for making the poor, poor. They also believe that elite countries like the U.S. and England have been the cause of so many failed countries in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and Latin America, countries that would be successful were it not for outside intervention.
To those on the left, the elite are those who have the most money and power. They are corporate CEOs, hedge fund managers, stock brokers, bankers and heirs to family fortunes. The Left finds these people to be greedy, gluttonous, power hunger , cruel, biased and taking unfair advantage of the working class. It is these elites, the Left says, who control our elected representatives with their demands for their special interests because they want to have all the money and power and want to control our country and then our world. These elite pay lower tax rates and live the high life while the rest of us suffer.
To those on the right, the elite are those who are highly educated. The elite attended our most elite colleges and universities. They are college professors, medical doctors, highbrow lawyers, psychologists and psychiatrists, economists, philosophers, journalists, historians, and scientists. The Right finds these people to be weak, condescending, amoral, controlling and trying to destroy our country’s moral and economic fiber with liberal laws and socialistic economic policy - taxing the rich too much to give free handouts to the undeserving poor. The Right feels that many on the left pay no taxes while trying to bleed the productive members of our society in their attempt to force equality of outcome on all of us.
It has therefore come as a shock to those reading the latest data concerning our distribution of wealth. It turns out that 90% of Americans are worth less than less than $600,000. This personal wealth includes the value of one’s stock, real estate, equity, bonds, 401Ks, and art collection. Many on the left, especially in the Bay Area, are worth much more than that. Are they then the elite - the top 10% of household wealth? And add to them many on the left who worked for local government and have retired with generous pension and medical coverage benefits? What are they worth?
A police officer or fire fighter who retires from service in San Francisco, as well as many nearby cities, will receive as much as 90% of his final pay as the base of his pension payments. This same person also will receive a Cadillac health coverage that costs the City $15,000 a year, more if the retiree has a dependent. Say the total value of both (the pension and medical coverage) is $100,000 a year, how much would one need to have in the bank or in stocks to earn $100,000 a year? At 2%, it is equal to $5 million. That’s a lot more than $600,000. So how many government retirees and members of the left are the elite?
The Right has similar problems though still comes closer to being its own ideal. The Right hates the educated elite and yet many on the right have college degrees and some have advanced degrees. But with the right, it causes one to wonder about the value of the education because of its lack of apparent effect. One current darling of the right has a medical degree. Another got a law degree being in the first and last graduating class at her decertified law school and went on to get a post graduate degree at a school that offers no such degree - another singular educational accomplishment. A third favorite of the right has a bachelor’s degree from the fifth college she attended. Only about one of every four Americans has a college degree, less than 10% have graduate degrees. So these leaders of the right who decry the intellectual elite, are themselves in that category, at least on paper. The minute they start talking, we forget about their educational credentials and so do they.
So what are we to do about this apparent cognitive dissonance? We can stop using the word “elite” in a negative manner and preserve it to honor excellence. We can start using the appropriate adjectives to describe what we misnamed “elite.”
The Left should start to clearly identify the culprits and their sin. I suspect that they are the corporate CEO’s, the Wall Street bankers and brokers, the lobbyists and the defense industry. Their collective sin is placing personal and corporate profit over morality or patriotism. They are not elite but they are rich and powerful and could have used their talents to help this country rather than just themselves.
The Right must come to realize that intelligence, education, science and philosophy are not bad or scary things. They are tools that can be used for good rather than greed. Those on the right can also be educated and let their minds and hearts combine to do the right thing. Their fight is, or should be, not with intelligence or education but with philosophy. What they object to from the left is its apparent and mistaken belief that we are all created equal and so our lives should have equal outcomes. The Left seems to always blame society rather than the individual when both are at fault. Those on the right legitimately believe that some people work harder and have more talent than others and should be rewarded accordingly. But they also mistakenly believe that the free market should be left to regulate itself without government interference disregarding the many past examples to the contrary. They would do well to realize that government regulation is necessary for everyone’s sake even the person or company that is tempted to trespass against someone. The Wall Street crash and recent real estate debacle should be sufficient evidence of that.
The Left must recognize that we are not all created equal and our effort and outcomes will not be the same. Some people have much more talent or perseverance than others in some areas. Some provide services that pay more than others and some people will have a lot more money and all that it buys. The people of the left must acknowledge that individuals and cultures have a responsibility to themselves and others to do their very best to achieve their full potential. People must be more self reliant and less dependent on the kindness of strangers and taxpayers. Unions, the darlings of the left, must appreciate individual differences and not treat all members as equally deserving regardless of actual performance. Merit should trump seniority and politics. The Left must accept the fact that with almost 50 million of our people living in or near poverty, we can not invite more poverty from other countries. American jobs should go to Americans and not the imported or exported poor.
Those on opposite sides of our political and philosophical spectrum should be able to come together on our many shared beliefs. We can produce a simple and fair tax system and use our collective wisdom to find the best uses for our redistributed wealth. We can reduce or eliminate waste, fraud, duplication of effort, and inappropriate government activities. We can encourage a culture that allows all of its citizens to achieve their highest level of activity and joy. We can be brought together by our unanimous and unifying love of our country and its people.
Or we can allow our extremes to tear our country and culture apart. The choice is ours to make.
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