They absorb a grand lie, then pass it on.

Their marriage of convenience to old money stems from the need for empiricism in the myth of the American Dream. They get their shot and then comes the proverbial devil's bargain.

They must learn to lord their riches over the rest of us like an entitlement. They gate their communities and travel in exclusive company, with safeguarding their newfound pot of money their highest practices. Just as Quentin (with the four part name) IV learns it at the knee of II and III while growing up, you have to protect the pot of money at all costs.

How reviled from safely behind elitist doors must be the ones who eschew the grand lie, who find their circumstance to be one of both subsistence in some luxury and ability to repay society writ large with the remainder?

Old money has some defectors as does its pretender, it is hereby noted, but not nearly enough.

Right at that moment of conception, as it were, the trained eye can spot the transformation. Two roads diverging, as in Robert Frost. Thank goodness a few rule-proving exceptions manage to maintain a vestigial sense of commonweal among both the old and the new monies. Bill Gates, the Koch brothers, Ben & Jerry, Mitt Romney and/or Rick Perry, PBS supporting foundations, members of Congress: compare and contrast.

To become new money, at its most American Dreamiest, your groundbreaking business model survives by surfing a sea of others' greed. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

At its least fair, you finagle things for anonymous others because of your position and are rewarded with a perk or a payment that would otherwise not have been forthcoming.

Rick Perry, a low-level state official, rules favorably here and there on his way to becoming governor, acquires acreage up at the lake down the lane from Junior Brown or whatnot, and turns it over for multiple figures profit. It's almost expected.

Herman Cain is blessed by this greed of others, yet with perfect amnesia has the nerve to fault the OWS'ers for not working hard enough to do better. Expected.

John Boehner gets 98% of what he wanted, markets freak, bond ratings are downgraded, and he doubles down with oeuvos the size of rancheros. Expected.

Every town and city elevates some of its citizens to run its affairs.

Higher offices may come, along the way, and then ascension to an office with associated costs so high it takes independent wealth, bartering skills or both to get and stay there.

In that place, you can find myriad examples of tentative new money,  packed in like sardines.

The United States Congress.

Would the savvy reader humor me by accepting an our society as a model train set metaphor?

Remember how your dad surprised you that Christmas with the basics: track, Lionel gear, sawhorses and plywood, and all that open area?

The delight you felt was that the locomotive went around and around, even if the layout remained bare for a time. Forget the asbestos clad pipes and the fuel oil tank nearby.

Just as the completion of the circuit rewards more than any Swiss chalet here, Iowa firehouse there, a civilized society leaves no loose ends. It utilizes its means to ensure none of its citizens experience needless suffering and are protected. Everyone at least gets to make the trip.

Toward that end, taxes are levied.

Extremes in the course of events sometimes necessitate borrowing against the future. It's what Jesus would have done with an extremely large credit limit, if unable to pay in full for all of His good works.

The interest on that borrowing would have to be accounted for in future taxes. Pronto. Running compounding debt for indeterminate periods is farthest from His financial plan. 

Perforce, that is how a civilized society functions. With or without the shameless Jesus siding. (Great band name.)

Now along comes your big brother and smacks your model train with a 2x4.

It could have been anywhere along the track but let's say it was the borrowing back straight. It's as if the heavy lumber were saying borrowing can also be used to pay for kickbacks proportional to the taxes paid by any individual.

The gear is toppled. That fake smoke is belching out sideways and somehow the 2x4 in your big brother's hands is none the less menacing. It could have landed anywhere, and still might.

Ensure against needless suffering?

Hey, we promise equal opportunity, not equal results.

Expected.

Taxes?

Hey, why should we pay for things for others we can afford to provide for ourselves?

Expected.

Interest on our debt?

It's the American way to make only the minimum payments and shop around for a 0% introductory rate when needed.

Expected.

Whomp!

Expected.

Regardless of where it may have landed this time, the 2x4 puts the "train set" in need of some serious repairs.

So it boils down to a choice. You can get out the parts box and build all manner of workarounds: elevated track, shunts, and tunnels.

All chewing gum and duct tape.

Or put it back the way it was before the beginning of your big brother's torment. And stand up to him with a 4x4.

But take heart. Like clockwork, new money in places of power is bound to show its cards.

When all the logical things to do are characterized otherwise by so-called hard and fast rules, you have to be open to the possibility it's all lies.

The grandest lie.

Luntzspeak.

Trouble is, for the least progressive walking among us, it can be so tempting to have a big pot of money that it clouds the cerebrial.

And sometimes it's a twofer.

It's in everybody's best interest to have the train complete a circuit.

Unless you're a big brother. Whomp!

So where did the above title come from?

I double dog dare you to listen to Bernie Sanders' next response to the Republicans' next cockamamy talking point without this writer's embellishment.

That really would be huge, which he endearingly calls yuge.

Incongruity incarnate.

"Eric Cantor - shut your face!"

New money gone bad doesn't get commonweal.

Its grand lie, even if borrowed without full understanding, depends on repetition and volume.

They've got their damn pot of money.

I've got those new money blues.