The ‘historic decoupling’ of the global elite

By Thomas Lifson

It’s the read of the day. Peggy Noonan has written a thought-provoking essay (follow this link) on a phenomenon we all recognize, the rise of global elites detached from the lives of ordinary people.

“Those in power see people at the bottom as aliens whose bizarre emotions they must try to manage.”

This is about distance, and detachment, and a kind of historic decoupling between the top and the bottom in the West that did not, in more moderate recent times, exist.

She uses as her example Angela Merkel’s Nazi guilt-inspired imposition of catastrophic levels of Muslims “refugees” on her people:

Merkel had put the entire burden of a huge cultural change not on herself and those like her but on regular people who live closer to the edge, who do not have the resources to meet the burden, who have no particular protection or money or connections. Ms. Merkel, her cabinet and government, the media and cultural apparatus that lauded her decision were not in the least affected by it and likely never would be.

She sees Merkel, in her detachment from the consequences of her decision, as similar to American liberals, such as.......Read more