The View From a Broken Clock

Barbara Walters defends Weiner, inadvertently stumbles across larger truth about the poor state of our Ruling Class:

“The View” host Barbara Walters has not kept it a secret that she has soon-to-be former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s side in his current controversy with some ill-advised photos he has sent out over the Internet.  However, she has moved on to wondering how he and his wife Huma Abedin will survive without Weiner’s congressional salary.

On Thursday’s “The View,” Walters speculated what might have happened if Weiner had stuck it out, but said it was finally coming to a conclusion with the announcement of his resignation.

“We don’t have any idea what she said,” Walters said. “But she did come home on Tuesday and he did consult with her Tuesday night. And had he stayed, there would have been investigations by the House Ethics Committee. The Democratic leaders had already been planning to strip him of whatever committee assignments he had and there would be questions. This puts a stop to it and at 2:00 today, he’s supposed to announce.”

But Walters seemed concerned with the announcement, as in where and if Weiner could find employment upon leaving Congress.

“You know, we can make fun of him but in a way it’s a tragedy,” Walters said. “[H]e’s never had another job. What does he do after this? … Many people have had a job before or they were lawyers.”

She ruled out him being a consultant and noted how thin his private sector experience was.

“Nobody is going to go to him to consult,” she continued. “He was [Sen.] Chuck Schumer’s consultant once, Chuck Schumer’s assistant and then I think he was a city councilman.”

But isn’t that the problem, in a nutshell? Traditionally, one had a life before becoming a public servant, coming from business or the military for example, and then ran for office. But in the last 40 or 50 years or so, too many public officials have viewed government as an end unto itself — and why not, considering how sweet the lifetime of perks are — both while in office and afterward.

But perhaps, as “Zombinomics” increasingly replaces a functioning economy that could support such perks, a few business owners and a few voters are wising up. Here’s Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus talking with Hugh Hewitt about President Obama’s disconnect from the economy: “He just doesn’t understand it. He never worked a day in his life. How would he know it?”