Defending the rich nowadays is a tricky business. Vulture capitalists have given the rich a very bad name, especially as some don’t build businesses but break them up for profit. Back in the good old days, a boss made 20 times a workers salary; now it’s 400 times minimum. Yep, defending the rich is not for the fainthearted, especially if one has inherited moolah, as is my case. In the PC world of today, people are ashamed and frightened to even acknowledge the slightest difference where wealth is concerned. There are, of course, those like The Donald and his family that flaunt their wealth, and the reason I’m not shocked is because of the outrage their flaunting causes among truly rich phonies, whose names will not appear in The American Conservative’s elegant pages.  

And yet, in this age of gushing exhibitionism, the Trump clan’s wealth has managed to raise eyebrows. Mind you, not mine. I remember the time when expensive European shindigs only raised cries of admiration. The Beistegui ball in Venice, the Rothschild balls in Paris, the Agnelli dance in the Bois de Boulogne, the Bamford bash of last year—I could go on. “Smarmy” and “bogus” are the two words that come to mind when I read the names of left-wing so-called journalists complaining about today’s rich. In fact, about a year ago, a hatchet job against me appeared in the Atlantic, one I never read, but in which it said that I was using my wife’s money. As always, the truth is quite the opposite. My wife has many noble titles, but the money she has is mine. She read the article, but refused to dignify it with an answer. Never mind. One does not expect anything resembling the truth to appear in left-wing sheets. 

The Trump moolah shocks because the clan is devoid of charisma. As are the Bezoses, but Jeff has recently defended the rich as if he were Talleyrand defending diplomacy—somewhat equivocally, to say the least. Before I quote him, a reminder that envy has always been with us. What puzzles me is that America’s rich are mostly self-made, people who started with nada. They deserve kudos rather than insults.  And I can see Europeans envying and hating inherited privilege and ostentatious wealth paid for by the workers, as practiced by Britain’s royal family, but it’s not like this in the good old U.S. of A. 

Bezos and other corporate giants have created more jobs and fostered more self-reliance than any government program. The profit motive affects and improves peoples’ lives much more than good intentions. Bezos started with nothing but managed to create upward of $11 trillion of wealth for society since he started. The irony is that, if the government decided to take away Jeff’s wealth, it would keep that same government running for almost a week—c’est tout, as they say in the land of cheese: that is all. 

What amazes me more than anything is how the left can exist here in America of all places. In a land where most of the wealth is self-made, to be on the left is at best a pose. And what the lefty media, academy, and entertainment industry do is shape thought and society to the lowest standards of decency and the nastiest people. It’s envy, my friends, pure and simple. Free markets and wealth creation are what irks the left, the very same people who contend that the rich don’t pay their fair share. Yet the U.S. has the most progressive tax system in the world, with the top 1 percent paying around 45 percent, and the top 10 percent paying around 75 percent. 

Subscribe Today

Get daily emails in your inbox

Email Address:

A decent man but a professional liar like Bernie Sanders can scream all day against the rich, but how many people live off of what he pays them? Out of his own pocket, that is. My father employed thousands in his factories and ships. Woody Johnson’s Jets might not be so good—in fact they stink (they’re overpaid)—but he employs hundreds of thousands who produce his medical products. Phonies like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez can wail against the rich, but where would many of those who listen to her lies be if people like Johnson had moved to Monaco, shut down his business, and spent his time in the casino? Look at Cuba without the Fanjuls, and look at Florida with them. 

And while I’m at it, when was the last time you watched a film portraying a nice rich man? Maybe 50 or so years? These cinematic Jacobins would sell their mothers for a dollar, yet always show the rich to be, well, like themselves when you come down to it. Socialism sounds fine on paper, but it has never, ever worked. Replacing the frigidity of rugged individualism, as the socialist New York mayor recently bloviated, with the warmth of collectivism is as big a lie as when the boy asks the girl to let him put it—well, never mind. An alternative view is what distinguishes civilized people. But the left has done away with it. Hate now reigns against anyone that believes in freedom rather than leftist dogma. Let the state seize the means of production—factories, land, property—and watch the country turn into Somalia. Which might suit a few female members of Congress, but not me. 

The Gilded Age gave us museums, concert halls, libraries, beautiful houses to admire, urban parks, universities, and a style to be wondered at by future generations. Collectivism has given the human race concentration camps, poverty, and misery. Yet people still pretend that it’s a better alternative.