Martin Schneider writes:

I'm still reeling from the resentments and denial and misguided assumptions inherent in Laura Bush's interview with Chris Wallace of FOX News, as quoted in this Jezebel post, anyway. (I haven't watched the interview itself.)

The takeaway is that Laura Bush censored herself in order to conform to the image of a good conservative wife, and now she's upset that she doesn't get the fawning press that Michelle Obama gets. Something like that. For me, the whole thing is resonant in tons of ways, as if the cross-section of gender, politics, and society isn't generally volatile.

Bush's mild griping about being placed in a "box" proves yet again that when it comes to femininity, even relatively shrewd choices that involve denying one's own power as a woman are counterproductive. Laura Bush, who I believe is pro-choice, anti-war, and in favor of increased civil rights for homosexuals, took one for the team, played the quiet wifey, and now she envies liberal women who, whether it works out (continued)

Martin Schneider writes:

Recently Ezra Klein, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Conor Friedersdorf, and Andrew Sullivan have been blogging about New York City's overweening cultural clout and—interesting, this—the tendency of its residents to behave in a smug manner.

I must say, the discussion has been extremely disappointing, and I came away from it feeling frustrated, annoyed, and not a little insulted. I guess it is helpful to find out how much people dislike you for reasons that seem insufficient or inaccurate. Such is the power of cultural envy, or something like cultural envy.

The discussion proceeded along the following lines: Friedersdorf wrote about New York's worrisome centrality in all cultural matters and its pernicious effects on other major cities. Sullivan weighed in, agreeing and complaining about how "irritating" New Yorkers' "narcissism" is. Accepting New Yorkers' smugness as a given, Coates then wrote a fairly empathetic post in which he gamely tried to put that (continued)