From the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office figures (from 2005): In 1979 the share of national after-tax income going to the top 1 percent of households was around 7.5%. By 2005, the figure had more than doubled to 15.6 percent. Indeed, the number went from 14.0 to 15.6 from 2004 to 2005 alone (they must have really worked harder that year!). So much for “trickle-down” economics. Worker productivity has gone up but not shares of national wealth for the middle and lower income classes.

At this rate, how can anyone running for president not point this out?

As an aside, I’ve always been interested in home design for 30 years. I like a bit of room. I could never afford it, but I can think of a few things that I’d squeeze into, say, a 5,000 square foot house that would get left out of a 2000-2500 square foot house. I’ve seen plans for even 8,000 square feet that had “the basics” plus a bit more–merely poorly designed. But after that, what do you actually put into such a house? Maybe I can’t stand the poor designs, but I can’t think of anything useful. Even a home theatre system, a bowling alley, an indoor pool, and a small gym would fit easily under 8,000.

Am I stupid, or have I misread your post? I’m just cautious about the view that the intelligence or interests of the “average American” is the problem with American government. It’s the intelligence and interests of our elected fools that’s the problem, and they’re not elected through the dimwittery of Americans at large. They’re elected by people who know exactly what they’re doing.

We have other problems beside politics. There’s almost nothing that qualifies as high culture anymore, which is a multi-layered problem involving morals, taste, education and a list of other qualities we no longer take seriously. Politics is way down the line of destructive influences. America is dying from the inside out.

That’s my deepest concern, not that the proles are too stupid and vulgar to apprehend the difficulties of governing. They’re too stupid and vulgar to learn and appreciate anything. I’m happy they don’t vote. It’s progressives who want them to, and when I hear some egalitarian rant about participatory democracy alongside the realities of American life, I want to close my head in the door.

Didn’t you know? The Common Man is code for Dumb Shmuck. Shlub represented self-restraint on my part.

“…the average American shlub”? You people used to have the courtesy to call him The Common Man. What’s changed?