Larry $ummers and the new establishment
Two smart friends respond to the report that Larry Summers received millions from a hedge fund before coming back into government, as well as hundreds of thousands for speaking engagements.


Friend 1: This made my jaw drop this morning; the collected 2008 honorariums of Lawrence Summers; not just the amounts but who the people are that were writing his checks all year. Establishments are amazing things.

Friend 2: Don't forget how Summers got the Harvard job. Robert Rubin was a key figure on the Harvard Overseer Board. You ought to do a posting some time about how Jewish Harvard alumni transformed that once WASPish school. The story of the University of Pennsylvania is even more amazing. How the establishment replicates itself in the 21st century. The Ivy League University has replaced the Country Club as the breeding ground for the elite - Obama wouldn't join a country club, yet he is Prez.

Can't outsmart my friends! I saw some of that happen at Harvard. At my 25th year reunion I had to listen to Rubin's speech-about-nothing. Of course, I wonder how much of the money is Jewish--out of my sense that Jews were (are?) the engine of the information-age economy. And America's a fluid place; we admire wealth-production. Like to marry successful people. Thus the high intermarriage rates.
I'd add that Hudson Institute gave Summers $10,000. Neocon holdout. And of course Summers stopped the divestment initiative in its tracks a few years back when he was Harvard President and said that it was anti-Semitic in intent. The new establishment is philosemitic and Israel is as American as cherry pie.