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As a longtime liberal, it makes me cringe when Hillary Clinton breaks out the liberal elitist card. It strikes me as hypocritical for the same reasons pointed out in this article:
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Hypocrisy of the Right - How Elites Call the Left Elitist
Posted 4/11/2008 8:23 AM CDT
How is it that wealthy, Ivy League educated Republicans call Democrats "liberal elites"? In The Nation this month, Eric Alterman addresses this issue with a little history thrown in. He points out that that particular talking point goes all the way back to 1964 when Ronald Reagan, supporting Goldwater, accused liberals of "an intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves." Nixon spoke of "bureaucratic elite" in his campaign speeches. But it was ethically challenged Spiro Agnew, with speechwriters Pat Buchanan and William Safire, who used the lines, "pusillanimous pussyfooters," "hopeless hysterical hypochondriacs of history," "nattering nabobs of negativism" and "effete corps of impudent snobs," and really got the myth rolling.
Since then, the right wing myth of the "liberal elite" and "cultural elite" has been perpetuated, aligned to undermine "the rest of us". Indeed, the campaign has been effective, but it is hard to figure out what they mean by the term, and it seems all purpose, repeated endlessly on right wing hate radio and Fox Noise. Limbaugh says that his success is a result of "middle America's growing rejection of the elites," defined by him as "professionals" and "experts," including "the medical elites, the sociological elites, the education elites, the legal elites, the science elites...and the ideas this bunch promotes through the media."
But, Alterman points out that conservatives, of course, don't want to do away with elites, just replace them with their own. For example, right wing pundit Laura Ingraham, who wrote an entire book on this subject, grew up in Connecticut, daughter of an attorney, went to Dartmouth and Univeristy of Virginia Law School and now lives in a big house in Washington, D.C. Ann Coulter is another textbook example. She is also a second generation Connecticut lawyer and graduate of Cornell, another IVY LEAGUE college.
One of the funny aspects of the false, "elitist hating" crowd, is that, when given the opportunity to bring in someone from the "real America" to the seats of power, they howled to the roof. That person was Harriet Miers, graduate of SMU's Law School. They all screamed that she had no credentials and that SMU wasn't good enough. Former Bush speechwriter, David Frum, complained, "to take a hazard on anything other than a known quantity of the highest intellectual and personal excellence" was "simply reckless." Another neo-con, Andrew Sullivan said of the nomination, "I'm beginning to think that this appointment was an expression of the president's contempt for the conservative intelligentsia." When Bush caved, and nominated Princeton and Yale educated Sam Alito, all wounds were healed. This after Harvard University and Harvard Law graduate John Roberts had also been confirmed to the court.
I could go on, but you get my drift. Conservative elitists, primarily educated at Ivy League schools, sons and daughters of wealthy east coasters, have successfully turned the word "elite" into a similar negative term like "liberal". It doesn't matter that they are members of the absolute pinnacle of our society. They use this lie, like many others, to put people in social classes to gain power and maintain power.
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