Versailles

DougJ:

What I think is more insidious, though, than wingnut dentists’ cutting back their hours or Mrs. Instapundit cutting back on whatever it is that she normally does, is the widespread belief among elites that they and their colleagues are indispensable men. Like one of JMM’s readers, I fear that Geithner thinks that our economy would be decimated if we forcibly Galted the geniuses who ran our financial industry into the ground. I fear that when Andrew Sullivan and Joe Klein gush about the greatness of David Brooks, it’s because they view themselves and each other as a d’Anconia-Danneskjöld-Galt punditocratic triumvirate that may yet save the world from unseriousness and blogofascism. I even fear that when Villagers praise Obama’s “political gifts”, they’re doing so for the same reason they praised George Bush’s cowboy gut instincts; that is, because they feel that the talents of leaders in Washington reflect upon its scribes. To put it simply, I fear that we are now ruled by incompetent egomaniacs who will never blow the whistle on each other, no matter how bad things get, because to do so would be to admit that none of them is indispensable or brilliant after all.