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Read other letters about this article
....Mark Udall and Tom Udall, sons of Morris Udall, U.S. Senator -- CarolynC
1) For the record, I think Tom Udall is the son of Stewart
Udall, not "Mo" Udall. The point that the Udalls are a political
dynasty going back ~50 years is correct, however.
Another very famous dynasty that we haven't mentioned is the
notorious Long family of Huey Long fame, from Louisiana. Boy,
howdy, didn't they do their state a whole lot of good! (Not.)
2) Bernbart, your blithe assertion that nepotism in American politics goes back a long way in time does not, in any way, make it a good thing. Nor does it touch on Glenn's hypothesis that nepotism is increasingly accepted and increasingly detrimental to our interests. As pedinska can (attempt if she will) to explain, there is no such thing as a "public service gene". There are many cultural reasons why the offspring of elected officials are more likely to go into politics themselves -- but they are determined by access, connections and experience, not DNA.
3) The Princessification of middle class girl children is a real
cultural problem, but it's also a real stretch to link it to
the skanky, adult-world nepotism that infects our political
culture. I don't think it has anything to do with hereditary
"gifting" of success in real life, quite the opposite. Drenching
little girls with princess toys & stories functions as a
way of setting them up for failure in real life; when you're no
longer "cute" and pretty and under 25, the imaginary princess tiara
disappears, and instead of focusing on how to get ahead in the
real world, you are hamstrung for a decade or more trying to
find where it went.
The princess-industrial toy industry screws girls. That's what its
there for, IMHO.
