Mark Steyn weighs in on the DSK affair. A morsel:
As the developed world drowns under the weight of Big Government, the gilded princelings of statism will hunker down in their interior courtyards and guard their privileges ever more zealously. Once in a while, as in that Manhattan hotel suite, a chance encounter between the seigneurs and their subjects will go awry, but more often, as in the Geithner confirmation, it will be understood that the Great Men of the Permanent Governing Class cannot be bound by the rules they impose on the rest of you schmucks.
Whole thing here.
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Mark Steyn’s piece is so ridiculously silly that it does not deserve analysis. For starters, the main thrust of his essay — that powerful men like DSK take advantage of powerless women because “the developed world (is drowning) under the weight of Big Government” — is nonsense, as this sort of thing has been going on since the days of Little Government and even No Government. You need not look further than Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemmings or Strom Thurmond and the mother of his love child for examples of white men behaving badly with black women. Examples of white men behaving badly with white women are far too numerous to mention, but in recent history have included FDR, Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ, and Clinton, as well as (by rumor) Nixon and Bush I. Among primates, the alpha male propagates the species. Big Government has nothing to do with it.
However, there are two things in Steyn’s piece which are truly, truly offensive, and for that reason it deserves rebuke.
Let’s take the statement that “Geithner is currently running around bleating that we need to raise the $14 trillion debt ceiling another couple of trillion.” First, let’s delete the “bleating” reference. When you have to comb over the bald spots in your argument by saying that someone of opposing views bleats, rants, spews, or whatever, you have said nothing about whether those views are right or wrong. Geithner is doing what any Treasury Secretary should do: make it abundantly known that nothing would be as reckless or damaging to the national interest as a default on its obligations.
The offensive part is Steyn’s blaming of Geithner for the fact that we have an expanding debt which needs to be paid. Needless to say, the Treasury Department does not make appropriations. It pays the bills. So, for example, when Congress borrows over one trillion dollars to fund a war in Iraq, the amount borrowed plus its accumulated interest must be paid (not to mention the continuing costs of treating wounded soldiers, keeping troops there, etc.) Or choose any other government service: you can’t reasonably borrow money and then complain when your lenders want it back. Making a big stink now about bills which were incurred in the past, and then blaming the guy who is in charge of paying them, is ludicrous.
The second thing which is mightily offensive is his statement that “Neither Geithner nor Strauss-Kahn have ever created a dime of wealth in their lives. They have devoted their careers to ‘public service,’ and thus are in the happy position of rarely if ever having to write a personal check. “
Well, let’s see. Along with Paulson and Bernanke, Geithner saved the American economy from imminent collapse. The day that Geithner walked into office, the economy was losing over 700,000 jobs a month, credit markets were frozen, and the automakers and nearly all of the largest banks and financial institutions were insolvent. Absent an aggressive and innovative response, the greatest economic collapse in seventy years would have become the greatest economic collapse ever.
We are now in a situation where the economy is gaining about 200,000 jobs, GDP and corporate profits are at record levels, and banks are lending. For the first time in years, GM is profitable and hiring new workers. None of these things would have happened without TARP, the stimulus, the auto bailouts, and Fed easing. Geithner “never created a dime of wealth” in his life? Please.
However, it was the derogatory reference to “public service” that got me cheesed off in the first place. At any point in his career, Geithner could have gone to the private sector and made megabucks, just like Obama could have taken his Harvard Law degree to be a wealthy partner in a law firm. I will give credit to anyone who decides that there are some things which are worthier than taking the path which leads to the greatest riches.
As the father of a school teacher, I am sure you would agree that those in “public service” can make contributions which are more profound and long-lasting than those made by bean counters. Something which I do not think is understood by the odious and bullying Chris Christie.
Steyn’s piece uses the Tea Party meme that if you work for industry and make widgets, you are performing a higher public service than those awful people who work for Big Government. Moreover, if you’re high enough in Big Government, you can take advantage of your chattel with abandon. Woohoo! I would place Geithner’s contribution above that made by Steve Jobs, Brin & Page, or anybody else, just as I would place your daughter’s contribution above those made by pretty much anybody working in the private sector.
Mark Steyn: what a putz!
I liked Steyn’s writeup! Geithner is a boob. He didn’t pay his taxes. I’m an idiot with equally complex tax issues and I still manage to pay my taxes.
It’s Nick’s birthday, Pete, and rather than get into yet another ten-thousand-word wrangle with you. I’ll just leave it to the readers to make up their own minds.
Opinion columnists are going to say things like “bleat”. Grow a skin.
Happy birthday to Nick. I dare not play him in chess.
Writing that Timothy Geithner bleats is no different than calling George Bush Chimpy McHitler. It simply indicates that the writer has nothing to say.
If you take any random Wall Street Journal editorial and change the purple prose to neutral terms – e.g., replace “ranted” with “stated” – and then delete all of the insinuations that those of opposing views hold them for malign reasons, you’ll usually find that there’s not much left. The Journal is hardly unique in this regard, but they are particularly egregious.
As I approach the senility and decrepitude which accompany late middle age, I should have learned by now to suffer fools like Mark Steyn gladly. With greater maturation, I would simply ignore people like Steyn – who never in his life will make a contribution anywhere near what Geithner has done – making snide and calumnious assertions about those who, like Geithner, have given up a life of untold riches to go through the inferno of contemporary politics and achieve something of lasting value.
When Ted Williams did not acknowledge cheering fans at Fenway after his last at bat, John Updike famously observed that God doesn’t answer postcards. I’m not saying that Tim Geithner is God – we all know that Clapton is – but I do know that Steyn doesn’t do anything more than send useless post cards.
The New York Post reports that before he was taken from the Air France jet, DSK barked at a flight attendant, “Quel beau cul” — French for “nice ass.” Another version of this phrase is “O quel cul t’as,” which was the pun behind the name of the play Oh! Calcutta!
Geithner’s vow of poverty will continue once he writes his tell all novel and starts consulting for hedge funds.
Steve “just lucky” Jobs is a one trick pony with that iphone fad.
“Writing that Timothy Geithner bleats … simply indicates that the writer has nothing to say.”
“Mark Steyn: what a putz!”
Does the first quoted remark also apply to the writer of the second?
Of course not. Steyn is a putz. Truth is an absolute defense against libel.
Convenient.