Clintons and “thugs” not good for a campaign

A while back I wrote a piece entitled Clinton Global Initiative’s Thuggish Member, about a FOB/FOH who had – to my way of thinking – crossed a line from advocacy, to thuggish zealotry:

“It is my intention to destroy your career as a liar,” Mr. Eckhart wrote. “If you produce one more editorial against climate change, I will launch a campaign against your professional integrity. I will call you a liar and charlatan to the Harvard community of which you and I are members. I will call you out as a man who has been bought by Corporate America. Go ahead, guy. Take me on.”

I thought then, and still want to believe, that such thuggery is a rare sort of thing. Today Glenn Reynolds links to Mickey Kaus who has other FOB/FOH “thuggish” behavior on his mind, and who also links to a story citing a generous FOB/FOH who seems more “Corporate America” than Mother Teresa, if you know what I mean. Aren’t the Dems always telling us how much they hate “Corporate America,” and how much they’re for “the little guy?”

Interesting sideline to that story: Chelsea Clinton works for Avenue Capital and makes an estimated 6 figure salary. Not bad for a woman in her mid-twenties and I certainly don’t begrudge her; Chelsea seems to be a private and perfectly nice person, and if either of my kids could make that kind of sugar not long after college, I’d say “buy Mama a condo near the water when she is old” and be happy for them.

But one cannot help noting that all we ever hear about President Bush is that he is “rich,” from “old money” and he represents “greedy capitalism” etc, etc…yet, his daughter Jenna is a public elementary school teacher in Washington DC, by no means a glamour gig. The Dems continually say they’re all about taking on the big greedy capitalists and terrible corporations that hurt the middle class and the environment, yadda, yadda, yet the Clintons friends are all incredibly wealthy – mostly “new” money – they’re all very “Corporate” and their daughter works in the “corporate” world (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Seems like there are stereotype templates at work here (GOP evil, greedy, uncaring, rich – Democrats Middle Class, compassionate, unmaterialistic, good) that don’t quite jibe with the reality, no?

It’s of a piece with Hillary having every right to (quite understandably) send Chelsea to private school when the family was in the White House, but to steadfastly maintain that poor parents should not have vouchers to help them make a similar good choice. Her solution – to continue to throw money at failing public schools – has not worked in 30 years. Why not try something new?

In any case, I don’t think it’s good for any presidential campaign to find people attaching the word “thug” to it, and coming to that word individually, on their own, without prompting.

Oh, and I’ve long been on record as not begrudging the rich their riches:

I…do not begrudge the hyper-rich their riches.

What we do begrudge them is their “superior” disdain for our values, and their hectoring that we are somehow less compassionate, less well-meaning, gosh darn it just LESSER people because we believe in giving a hand, rather than a hand-out.

I mind gazillionaires like Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, Jon Corzine and Hillary “we’re going to have to take some things away from you for the common good” Clinton pretending that our yearly income, our solidly middle-class income (and very modest emergency fund) is too, too much for us, unfair to others, undertaxed, greedy, ignoble and selfish. I mind people who are bouncing on fluffy pillows of honest-to-goodness wealth shaking a rhetorical finger at us for daring to try to get comfortable on our foam rubber mats of hard-earned wages.

I absolutely don’t mind others having wealth…I mind when they define it as one thing for themselves and another thing for us ordinary folks.

WELCOME: <a href="http://www.Instapundit.com" readers, and thanks, Glenn, for the link. While you’re here, please look around. Today we’re also talking about the staggering inauthenticity of this Election season, whether there is a difference between Madmen and Catholics, (I’ll be adding to that when I have time), we’re reminding a forgetful Katie Couric why we went into Iraq and what everyone believed at the time, thinking about seeing The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (and ordering the book!), we’re watching a fun video and btw, the the Steel Cut Oatmeal is fantastic and addictive!