The liberal intelligentsia has this challenge before them: they have adopted a set of linguistic and cultural codes that they have embedded so deeply into their political aspirations that they now view them as inseparable from those aspirations. Not coincidentally, those linguistic and cultural codes are also those that elevate them in their competitive social hierarchy, helping to pose them as smarter, cooler, and more righteous than others. Those linguistic and cultural codes have been demonstrated to be totally incapable of achieving the kind of economic and political change they say they want. The question is, are they willing to adopt a new strategy in order to achieve those changes, if it means that they lose the social clout in the process? The answer, it appears, is no.

The liberal intelligentsia has this challenge before them: they have adopted a set of linguistic and cultural codes that they have embedded so deeply into their political aspirations that they now view them as inseparable from those aspirations. Not coincidentally, those linguistic and cultural codes are also those that elevate them in their competitive social hierarchy, helping to pose them as smarter, cooler, and more righteous than others. Those linguistic and cultural codes have been demonstrated to be totally incapable of achieving the kind of economic and political change they say they want. The question is, are they willing to adopt a new strategy in order to achieve those changes, if it means that they lose the social clout in the process? The answer, it appears, is no.

—[Pondering the Imponderables with Adam Kotsko

Fredrik deBoer](http://fredrikdeboer.com/2014/11/05/pondering-the-imponderables-with-adam-kotsko/)