Who are we talking about when we say "elites"?

Multiculturalism- define

Renaissance man-  define

Socialize the cost of developing talent?

The reverse argument-  something quite good is argued to be something quite bad. 

Enjoying a papaya dog is the same as collecting renaissance art from italy?


middle class and poorer americans are subject to disdain?

No understanding of the how money gives one access to a wider variety of tastes and culture?

Their fault that they don't take advantage?




In a nation of many cultures such as ours, with expansive communications networks and great educational systems, we have all come to appreciate each other and each other's cultures. The appreciation, learned in childhood, has evolved into an appetite for the culture of others; travel, food, art, cinema, theatre, museums. This is nothing new. But more and more people today can partake. This multicultural influence is not something to be ridiculed as elitism. Embracing different cultures is what we are taught and what we seek to achieve as ideal. It is about understanding, communication and peace. This is the obvious and good purpose of a multicultural society.  Those who seek to undermine that purpose no doubt have a hidden agenda and I call you out Mr. Kahn.

Its not going to work.  I like my Christian friends and my jew friends.  I like my black friends and my white friends. I like pastrami, fried chicken, egg rolls and spaghetti.  Its all good. 

I do not think 100% of the reason people don't succeed is because they are don't have what it takes. Sometimes they are not smart enough, sometimes not in the right place at the right time, sometimes their childhood was bad, sometimes they were abused, sometimes they don't want it, sometimes they just quit.  Most people I know of any maturity understand the potentially complex causes of failure to enter the "elite" and few if any consider it a "failure" in the larger sense. None consider themselves better but all look forward to the opportunity to prove that they are.

I'm also incredibly puzzled at the notion that we "refuse to socialize" the development of talent. You'd have to quantify that statement otherwise the obvious truth of public education system, financial aid packages, student loans, affirmative action.  Forget it.  The comment has no meaning. 




	For better or worse, right or wrong, I'm counting myself among the "elite" discussed in Shamus Kahn's article, "The New Elites".
	
	Despite the fact that I don't qualify under many of his broad and mean-spirited criteria (phew!). 
	
	Sometimes, theses conjured up in dimly lit warrens of Columbia University, are best filed and aged and reread later in life to see if they still resonate. This is certainly the case here. 
	
	You see, I am the child of a 'mixed' marriage'; a jew and a Christian, an American and an Englishwoman and both poorer than dirt. We settled in a 'mixed' community of jews, Italians, Germans, Blacks, Indians, Arabs and anything else you can think of. I had a liberal arts education at Brandeis University and studied law at Brooklyn Law School. I was in the textile business for many years which took me to Georgia and North Carolina for the better part of 14 years. I worked with people of all races, religions and backrounds. I can tell you that what Mr. Kahn describes.