TCTI: Too Crazy Too Ignore
 Dave Ross
Chris Hayes

Twilight of the Elites

July 13, 2012 @ 1:13 pm (Updated: 7:16 am - 7/14/12 )

cedargrove
Chris Hayes, author of Twilight of the Elites, says that we are all losing the American Dream. (Mynorthwest.com/File)

We see America as a place where you can start out poor and die rich.

"The notion of the American Dream is that you can end up in that small circle of winners," says author Chris Hayes.

But in a book called Twilight of the Elites, Chris Hayes - he also hosts a show on MSNBC - writes that it's not working.

It's supposed to work. We've built a meritocracy based on competitive examinations, so that the positions of influence are filled by people who deserve it, without regard to race, or who you know, and yet for all that, social mobility is declining.

His own high school in New York - Hunter - is a case in point. It admits students based strictly on test scores, but even that hasn't leveled the playing field.

"We've seen a fairly dramatic decline in the number of black and Latino students admitted, to the point where it's now 3 and 1 percent, respectively. This is in a city that's a majority of black and Latino. And along with that, the growth of a test-prep industry," says Hayes.

Which means it's the students who can afford the test prep who get in, and so we're back to rewarding kids who come from money.

Oh for the fifties, when incomes were so much more equal!

Yet look what it took to create that equality: a citizenry which won a World War by investing, rationing, and recycling, and a government imposing a 90% tax rate on the rich, and willing to finance a home and a college education for any GI that wanted them. The government forcibly created a middle class. Something no one would tolerate today.

"If we are, in fact, passing the baton of privilege from one generation to the next, we're actually getting the opposite results from what we want, which is the idea that people can come from anywhere and end up at the top," says Hayes.


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Comments (88)


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  • Chuck Gould wrote...
    "Middle Class" runs counter to the historical experiences of all former economies...
    July 14, 2012 7:08 am
    and as Dave observed, what we have considered "middle class" for the last 65 years was almost forcibly created by government policies that even the left would find overreaching today.

    Middle Class is an artificial concept, if one examines the economies of history and even the economy of the US prior to WWII.

    We're already a good way down the track toward a binary economy once again. People will either be property owners and employ others to perform their labors ("rich") or people will be economic sharecroppers renting from and laboring for the more privileged class.

    Upper class? Here to stay, and growing very slowly as a sliver of formerly middle class folks claw their way up the economic food chain.

    Lower class? Even Jesus said the poor will always be with us. The lower class is growing much, much, faster than the upper class these days as wages stagnate and retract, job opportunities are more scarce, and prices for essentials (like food and gasoline)are rising.

    The former middle class? Oh, there are still plenty of the middle class around; but money inevitably flows to money and away from poverty. The rapidly growing lower class and the very slowly expanding upper class are both drawing from a shrinking pool of folks who can be considered "middle class" by last century's standards.

    Here's where somebody will chime in and claim that the poor in America are now as well off as the middle class were in the 1960's because most of the poor have access to a TV set......(just wait). Oh brother.

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  • ron prevost wrote...
    to paraphrase our Lord:
    July 14, 2012 8:17 am
    The poor will always be with us. Because democrats need their votes.

    Kind of a downer post from Dave Ross for a Saturday morning. Luke's contract must have just been renewed.

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  • heyjim55 wrote...
    Middle class?
    July 14, 2012 10:12 am
    Those of us who understand Leftism know full well that they don't approve of a middle class. Under their ideal Society there would only be two classes the ruling elite and everyone else. You can call it the ruling elite or "the party " it doesn't matter the result is the same wealth, prosperity and access to anything desired for the those who rule and for those who enforce the will of the elite. Everyone else will live in poverty, Chris Hayes like his cohorts really do want a two level system and his writings reflect that they are preparing their readers and followers for this eventuality. Get use to hearing this because it is what they want. Complain about the loss of the middle class while you quietly try to eliminate it, the President is working hard to achieve this by promoting welfare, food stamps and even commercials making it all look trendy and cool. Destroying capitalism is the goal here even though the US hasn't been a capitalist system for at least 20 years or more, they have created a ruling elite now it is a matter of seizing control(another 4 years) then finishing off our economy by collapsing it forcing us all to depend of the Government for survival Chris Hayes (Rachel Maddow clone male version)is a Marxist he just like his cohorts thinks people are to stupid to see it.
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  • jaysonoo7 wrote...
    Its not dead...
    July 14, 2012 7:20 am
    The lazy people just have a louder voice now... Every person I know that has a great work ethic, does not abuse any substances, and can stick with a budget does well...
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  • eddiewhite wrote...
    Chris Hayes is a...
    July 14, 2012 7:32 am
    douchenozzle that I'm not surprised to see Dave is a fan of.
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  • Rick (4) wrote...
    Lets look at Obama's term in office as an example
    July 14, 2012 7:43 am
    The rich have gotten richer since Obama has been in office at at rate great than any other President.

    The poor and middle class have gotten poorer since Obama has been in office at a rate greater than any other President.

    Obama holds the record for the most Americans at or below the poverty level.

    Obama has bailed out the rich with TARP money, stimulus money, tax cuts, etc. but has done nothing to bail out the poor and middle class.

    Obama is taking away jobs from the poor and middle class citizens of American by giving illegal aliens a free pass.

    Under Obama, African American unemployment rate is at the highest ever recorded in this country and also the at the highest ratio when compared to others.

    So IMO Obama has done more to hurt the middle class than any other President in US history.

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  • CH wrote...
    Rick Rick Rick . . . .
    July 14, 2012 8:04 am
    replace Dear Leader Obama with 'Bushed' and you got it right from the left.
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  • Rick (4) wrote...
    But CH you are wrong
    July 14, 2012 8:20 am
    Yes, Bush was bad and started the recession by signing all the spending bills sent to his desk. BUT, Obama has done 10 times the damage to the poor and middle class than Bush did. It only took Obama 4 years to to do this much damage and only a fool would give him another 4 years to do even more damage to the poor and middle class.
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  • Alex Mason wrote...
    It's called American Exceptionalism.
    July 14, 2012 8:06 am
    Chris Hayes is a galactic tongued douch-ebag. This ### hat makes up words that makes PC look actually non-PC. American Exceptionalism is the term, we curbedstomped communism back to the stone age thanks to the Reagan years. But let's keep dopes like these attention who-res in the "journalistic spotlight" demonstrating literary trash.
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  • ron prevost wrote...
    I was going to start with a reference to Gotterdammerung, but
    July 14, 2012 8:09 am
    when I read 'hosts a show on MSNBC' for Chris Hunter I realizes he wouldn't know a 'Twilight of the Gods' from Bedtime for Bonzo or from his own looser piece. .. If anything, all he offers is a twilight of hope.

    But the American dream was never, except in the most extreme of cases, starting poor and dying rich. It always has been, and still is, starting where you start and BETTERING your life. The dream is rising from poverty to having your own home in suburbia. Becoming the first of you family to graduate from college. Starting a small business - and starting again and again until successful. You don't need to be a Bill Gates - but you don't need to wallow in squaller forever.

    But I'll tell you what the American dream is NOT> It's not being taken care of from cradle to grave. Nor being sustained only well enough you do not starve. Nor living a life without hope.

    If the American dream is dying, why does the rest of the world still give up everything to try to come here? Legally or otherwise?

    But we can't be content on one side of the political spectrum to keep the dream for only ourselves. Nor can we on the other side to destroy the dream for everyone. The dream still lives. It will grow so long as it is a dream for ALL of America. And no one judged by their parents, but only on themselves.

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  • Paul Kersey wrote...
    As the elitist rulers in government get richer
    July 14, 2012 8:26 am
    the private sector gets poorer. Government has never been as rich, powerful, corrupt and deceitful as it is today. The rate of acceleration over the last 4 years is off the charts. When Obamacare kicks in to full gear, the USA as we knew it, will be finished permanently.

    This is not "Twilight of the Elites", but the dawning of a new age of tyranny. The middle class of the 50's was not created by government, but by individual freedom and a strong societal moral code.

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  • Paul Kersey wrote...
    You should get Dinesh D'Souza
    July 14, 2012 8:33 am
    to talk about his new movie "2016 Obama's America". You may learn something you will never hear from any host on MSNBC, the Obama Channel.
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  • Realitycheck wrote...
    And yet you still hear the naive voices
    July 14, 2012 8:53 am
    that say, oh if you just work hard, learn a profession well and spend within your budget you will do great. BS, if anything you will get by, but nobody will do great with wages that go down or stay the same when everything else goes up in cost constantly. Obama promised change, promised transparent government, called the debt Bush accumulated un-patriotic and yet here we are almost 4 years later with way more debt, less jobs but most important with way less well paying jobs. Plus no help (or very limited compared to how many did not get help) for underwater house owners yet we bailed out every bank that needed it with our money. Anybody who votes for Obama again is the same fraud and liar he is. This has nothing to do do with party (since I'm not excited about the Republicans either) this is taking a stand and saying we are done with all the lies and garbage you guys feed us just to get into office.
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