Money Talks
Dear Nora:
Peter Unger is the philosopher; Peter Singer is the animal-rights guy who
wrote the piece in the Times
Magazine based on Unger's ideas and
$200-a-child calculations. And no, I don't think nanny-state leftism is going
to make a big American comeback soon, either, at least not absent a depression.
(Although if the Dow market fell to, say, 6,000 tomorrow, we'd suddenly have
politics that mattered in this country.) But it does seem telling that the
Republicans' tax-cut talk is getting no real traction among the citizenry now.
And I guess what I mean by a revival of liberalism is more the inevitably
silly-looking but ultimately more-good-than-bad kind of guilty,
upper-middle-class and rich-person liberalism that makes excess impolitic and
unstylish, the way it was before 1982, and increases the (individual) American
impulse toward philanthropy and generosity. If Arthur Schlesinger is right
about his 30-year cycles, it's time.
Regarding Ron Perelman (and the Ron Perelmans of the world): At what level
of consciousness do you suppose he knows or cares that if he weren't rich he
wouldn't get to sleep with women like Patricia Duff and Ellen Barkin? And, even
more coarsely, how tightly do you think the Patricia Duffs and Ellen Barkins of
the world have to close their eyes and think of $$$ as they're being ravished
by unattractive billionaires? To use your phrase: just asking. And finally:
million-dollar end tables? Million-dollar end tables? Million-dollar
end tables ? That was the big boggler for me, Duff-and-Perelman-wise.
Yes (speaking of steely blonde women who make Faustian marital bargains in
the name of love, or "love"), I look forward to discussing Hillary and her
campaign against Rudy Giuliani (King Kong vs. Godzilla?) tomorrow.
Your pal,
Kurt
