Agreeing with David Brooks

It's not what I intended the first post of this blog to be but this is part of my story and what came up this morning.

Boy, it is not often that I agree with David Brooks of the New York Times.  But I suppose that this time I am REALLY agreeing with his reading of Robert Putnam's research on the "Requiem for the American Dream: Unequal Opportunity in America".  For Brooks' column: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/10/opinion/brooks-the-opportunity-gap.html?src=me&ref=general

What Brooks writes is: "Decades ago, college-graduate parents and high-school-graduate parents invested similarly in their children. Recently, more affluent parents have invested much more in their children’s futures while less affluent parents have not."

College educated parents are spending more time reading to their children, going to games, etc.  College educated parents (make more money so) spend more money on their children for opportunities like summer camp and sports and books and and and.

Robert Putnam: “It’s perfectly understandable that kids from working-class backgrounds have become cynical and even paranoid, for virtually all our major social institutions have failed them — family, friends, church, school and community.”
David Brooks: "As a result, poorer kids are less likely to participate in voluntary service work that might give them a sense of purpose and responsibility. Their test scores are lagging. Their opportunities are more limited."

Now Brooks can't resist putting in a dig at the decay of marriage and family that he sees in the poor.  His story further suggests that tax credits can help solve the money gap.  There we cannot agree.  But I value the story we share at the beginning: all kids need the world expanding opportunities that are open to the rich kids in America.  We all need the words of plays and poetry and books, the music of symphonies and music lessons, the thrill of whacking a ball and the pump of the blood as we run.  And the absence of those things creates a gap of experience that makes interactions harder between people.  We need, as a nation to make those things happen.

David Brooks: "Political candidates will have to spend less time trying to exploit class divisions and more time trying to remedy them — less time calling their opponents out of touch elitists, and more time coming up with agendas that comprehensively address the problem. It’s politically tough to do that, but the alternative is national suicide."