"I'm very democratic," he says after a time. "I think I'm the most democratic writer whom I know personally, though I don't know all writers of course." Silence. "I also believe in the United States. I think this is the greatest nation that ever existed, still is. It's really the only really democratic country in the world. Find me one country, just one country in the entire world that would let a foreign people -- different culture, different language, and in many cases different color than the majority of the native stock -- take over politically an entire metropolitan area in less than one generation. I'm talking about the Cubans in Miami . . ."
Mr. Wolfe has a habit of using experience and anecdote to gird an argument or shade a meaning, and he carries on like this for some time. Then, abruptly: "I really love this country. I just marvel at how good it is, and obviously it's the simple principle of freedom. . . . Intellectually this is the system where people tend to experiment more and their experiments are indulged. Whatever we're doing I think we've done it extremely, extremely, extremely well." Silence. "These are terrible things to be saying if you want to have any standing in the intellectual world." Tom Wolfe, in the Wall St. Journal this morning.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114204279173895576.html?mod=opinion_main_featured_stories_hs Read the whole thing.
Dow up 104 yesterday on better than expected jobs creation. Someday, I hope someone will properly recognize the yeoman work of Alan Greenspan and the administration in negotiating the post-bubble, post 9/11 economic landscape. It seems to me that the expansion has shifted into a self-sustaining mode now, which in my judgment is nothing short of miraculous.
The great American wealth-creating machinery continues to hum. One thing we can all be grateful for is that the opportunity to get rich is alive and well. I think rich people are underappreciated. Rich people create jobs, support cultural institutions, and pay most of the taxes in this country. They ask very little in return for the giant contributions they make, except to be left alone to continue doing what they do. Policies that create more rich people should be enacted.
Mr. Wolfe has a habit of using experience and anecdote to gird an argument or shade a meaning, and he carries on like this for some time. Then, abruptly: "I really love this country. I just marvel at how good it is, and obviously it's the simple principle of freedom. . . . Intellectually this is the system where people tend to experiment more and their experiments are indulged. Whatever we're doing I think we've done it extremely, extremely, extremely well." Silence. "These are terrible things to be saying if you want to have any standing in the intellectual world." Tom Wolfe, in the Wall St. Journal this morning.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114204279173895576.html?mod=opinion_main_featured_stories_hs Read the whole thing.
Dow up 104 yesterday on better than expected jobs creation. Someday, I hope someone will properly recognize the yeoman work of Alan Greenspan and the administration in negotiating the post-bubble, post 9/11 economic landscape. It seems to me that the expansion has shifted into a self-sustaining mode now, which in my judgment is nothing short of miraculous.
The great American wealth-creating machinery continues to hum. One thing we can all be grateful for is that the opportunity to get rich is alive and well. I think rich people are underappreciated. Rich people create jobs, support cultural institutions, and pay most of the taxes in this country. They ask very little in return for the giant contributions they make, except to be left alone to continue doing what they do. Policies that create more rich people should be enacted.
posted by alwaysright at
5:23 AM
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