And has Kerry really earned the name?

[thehackerdude_SC]

original post at http://slate.msn.com/id/2096401/

What's a Boston Brahmin?
And has Kerry really earned the name?
By Andy Bowers
Posted Monday, March 1, 2004, at 12:54 PM PT


In covering this year's presidential contest, journalists keep using the phrase "Boston Brahmin" to describe Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry. What exactly is a Boston Brahmin?

The term was coined by physician and writer Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. (father of the famous Supreme Court justice). Dr. Holmes used it both in a novel and in an 1860 Atlantic Monthly article called "The Brahmin Caste of New England" to describe the region's upper crust. The words caste and Brahmin indicate where Holmes got the idea.

In India, a Brahmin is "a member of the highest or priestly caste among the Hindus," according to the Oxford English Dictionary. By applying the term to his native Boston, Holmes was describing a more secular but equally powerful group—the city's entrenched WASP elite, or what he called its "harmless, inoffensive, untitled aristocracy."

 

[Jaden]

what exactly is your point?

 

[Raccoon]

I don't think he has earned the name. Of course, the only thing I know about him is that he is a Senator and he is doing very well in the Presidential race.

I think that Clinton is the Arkansas Brahmin.

 

[bamthedoc]

I'll break this down to also prove Clinton does not deserve it.

Harmless -- He, as many/most democrats, wants to just hand our military forces over to the UN and only get involved in conflicts they deem worthy of attention. This will kill more service men and women than anything Bush would do.

Inoffensive -- He has absolutely no respect for anything that presidency holds. He offends service men and women. He offends intelligent men and women. He...just offends.

Untitled Aristocracy -- "Aristocrat" is a title in and of itself.


Now I'll use the Oxford "definition" you gave...

a member of the highest or priestly caste among the Hindus

Apply the word Brahmin to Kerry really no longer applies. He is not very "high", especially in my eyes. He certainly isn't priestly, and he's an idiot, to boot.

 

[Above_70Percent]

Hrmm, First off bamthedoc are you Republican or Democratic? Secondly, Jaden he is not proving anything he is just wondering the meaning of the phrase, and what you think about it.

 

[bamthedoc]

I'd prefer non-partisanship as General George Wasthington wanted, but I must admit that, at the moment, my favor slips in the Republican's favor.

 

[Ciphus]

Amen bamthedoc. I don't holy Kerry on very high standars. My grandpaps is a Vet and he absolutely HATES Kerry for everything he's done. Brahmin is usually used to indicate the "top shit" pretty much. I guess that's how it would be in todays slang. I don't think that's Kerry. Really, I would only coin that term to past presidents.

 

[bamthedoc]

I don't like anarchists, and Kerry is an anarchists. I absolutely abhor his military record. He was a pacifist who aided in the demoralizing of the troops. I don't know how he got most/all of his metals, but he certainly doesn't deserve them in my book.

 

[dust601]

I haven't been paying as much intrest in canidates as i normally would but the majority of what ive heard from kerry is "i was a great soldier, bush wasn't, elect me because of that"
and that kinda puts me off from him.

 

[Ciphus]

Well I HOPE he goes with that slogan throughout the campaign. All Bush would have to do is show the truth and Kerry would lose. Ohh, and the medals he earned....he went and threw them on the steps of the capital building because he was disgusted. That a way to lead America!!!