Rule by meritocracy?

A couple of years ago I read an excellent article in the American Spectator entitled America's Ruling Class, describing the people heading our country's leading institutions (Government, the bureaucracy, education, etc.) All in all an interesting look at these people's education, wealth, etc. Here is a good point of the education of these supposed capable people.

...Much less does membership in the ruling class depend on high academic achievement. To see something closer to an academic meritocracy consider France, where elected officials have little power, a vast bureaucracy explicitly controls details from how babies are raised to how to make cheese, and people get into and advance in that bureaucracy strictly by competitive exams. Hence for good or ill, France's ruling class are bright people -- certifiably. Not ours. But didn't ours go to Harvard and Princeton and Stanford? Didn't most of them get good grades? Yes. But while getting into the Ecole Nationale d'Administration or the Ecole Polytechnique or the dozens of other entry points to France's ruling class requires outperforming others in blindly graded exams, and graduating from such places requires passing exams that many fail, getting into America's "top schools" is less a matter of passing exams than of showing up with acceptable grades and an attractive social profile. American secondary schools are generous with their As. Since the 1970s, it has been virtually impossible to flunk out of American colleges. And it is an open secret that "the best" colleges require the least work and give out the highest grade point averages. No, our ruling class recruits and renews itself not through meritocracy but rather by taking into itself people whose most prominent feature is their commitment to fit in. The most successful neither write books and papers that stand up to criticism nor release their academic records. Thus does our ruling class stunt itself through negative selection. But the more it has dumbed itself down, the more it has defined itself by the presumption of intellectual superiority...

A point I've made continually is education and intelligence are two different items. Many a politician shows off his degree as a sign of acumen. I can think of John F Kerry (who by the way served in Vietnam) or Joe Biden who has a law degree but no real achievement under his belt. Both men have education but in decades in the Senate they have few accomplishments. Then we look at some of the other idiots (John McCain) have accomplishments of dubious content. Trying to regulate speech through companion finance reform or looking into the use of steroids in baseball. Where do we get such men? (sarcasm intended).

Saw this article from the notional conservative at the NY Times, David Brook, on why our elites stink. and first we should look at a definition:

Meritocracy

1: a system in which the talented are chosen and moved ahead on the basis of their achievement

2: leadership selected on the basis of intellectual criteria

Why Our Elites Stink

Through most of the 19th and 20th centuries, the Protestant Establishment sat atop the American power structure. A relatively small network of white Protestant men dominated the universities, the world of finance, the local country clubs and even high government service.

Over the past half–century, a more diverse and meritocratic elite has replaced the Protestant Establishment. People are more likely to rise on the basis of grades, test scores, effort and performance.

Yet, as this meritocratic elite has taken over institutions, trust in them has plummeted. It’s not even clear that the brainy elite is doing a better job of running them than the old boys’ network. Would we say that Wall Street is working better now than it did 60 years ago? Or government? The system is more just, but the outcomes are mixed. The meritocracy has not fulfilled its promise.

Christopher Hayes of MSNBC and The Nation believes that the problem is inherent in the nature of meritocracies. In his book, “Twilight of the Elites,” he argues that meritocratic elites may rise on the basis of grades, effort and merit, but, to preserve their status, they become corrupt. They create wildly unequal societies, and then they rig things so that few can climb the ladders behind them. Meritocracy leads to oligarchy.

Hayes points to his own elite training ground, Hunter College High School in New York City. You have to ace an entrance exam to get in, but affluent parents send their kids to rigorous test prep centers and now few poor black and Latino students can get in...

...Today’s elite is more talented and open but lacks a self-conscious leadership code. The language of meritocracy (how to succeed) has eclipsed the language of morality (how to be virtuous). Wall Street firms, for example, now hire on the basis of youth and brains, not experience and character. Most of their problems can be traced to this...

Sorry Mr Brooks, the elites have just simply changed from a family protection racket to a racial, sex or sexual orientation racket. If you want a great example, our current president. It shows the failure of both systems, morality and merit. You don't go into the Ivy League for a good education but connections. And the Ivy's have earned the image of worthlessness.

Also every time a test is given for promotion for a fire department or a police department, is it meritocracy that leads to lawsuits to insure enough minorities and women are promoted. If that's promotion on merit I hate to see the real corruption.