Column, December 19, 2008, "The U.S. House of Lords?" at jewishworldreview.com.
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If you’re very very rich, you can buy your Senate seat by spending as much of your money as you want. Meanwhile, your poor plebian opponent is running around groveling for the small contributions allowed by law. Hence the Corzines and the Kohls, who parachute into Congress seemingly out of nowhere. Having given this leg up to the rich, we should resist packing our legislatures with yet more privileged parachutists, the well-born. True, the Brits did it that way for centuries, but with characteristic honesty. They established a house of Parliament exclusively for high-born twits and ensconced them there for life. There they chatter away in supreme irrelevance deep into their dotage. Problem is that the U.S. Senate retains House of Commons powers even as it develops a House of Lords membership.

— Charles Krauthammer

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "If you’re very very rich, you can buy your Senate seat by spending as much of your money as you want. Meanwhile, your poor plebian opponent is running around groveling for the small contributions allowed by law. Hence the Corzines and the Kohls, who parachute into Congress seemingly out of nowhere. Having given this leg up to the rich, we should resist packing our legislatures with yet more privileged parachutists, the well-born. True, the Brits did it that way for centuries, but with characteristic honesty. They established a house of Parliament exclusively for high-born twits and ensconced them there for life. There they chatter away in supreme irrelevance deep into their dotage. Problem is that the U.S. Senate retains House of Commons powers even as it develops a House of Lords membership." in the context of "Column, December 19, 2008, "The U.S. House of Lords?" at jewishworldreview.com." to mean that wisdom is timeless.

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Source: Wikiquote: "Charles Krauthammer" (Quotes, 2000s, 2008) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
Charles Krauthammer

About Charles Krauthammer

Charles Krauthammer (March 13, 1950 - June 21, 2018) was an American Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and political commentator. He wrote a weekly column syndicated to more than 400 newspapers worldwide, including The Washington Post. He was also a contributing editor to the Weekly Standard, a panelist on Fox News's Special Report with Bret Baier, and a panelist on the PBS news program Inside Washington.