Article snippet: Posted at 9:35 pm on July 11, 2017 by streiff Two of my colleagues, Brad Slager and Sarah Lee, have posted on David Brooks’s recent column in which he revealed himself to be something of a smug, elitist twit. If you’ve read Brooks over the years you’ll know this is not a major discovery, in and of itself. What is revolting about it is how Brooks blames parents for trying to improve their children’s chances in life (full disclosure: I plead proudly guilty to this accusation). We ignore Brooks at our peril. Many years ago, I was actively involved in “issues management” on the Army Staff. (Confession: we were afraid to do anything about anything.) The basic theory is this: Major cultural and technological changes don’t happen overnight. They percolate. If you wait until an issue is hot, then you’ve either won or lost, depending upon where you sit. One great case study was how industrial powerhouse Johns-Manville went bankrupt from asbestos lawsuits. From 1930-1982, Johns-Manville was part of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. But as early as 1929, Johns-Manville was paying disability payments to workers with asbestos related diseases and the company knew asbestos was the cause. Despite this knowledge, Johns-Manville pressed on with its business model. In 1970, asbestos was recognized as a hazardous substance and by 1982 Johns-Manville went into Chapter 11 under the weight of class action lawsuits brought by asbestos victims and their survivors. The point being that ... Link to the full article to read more