What was demoralizing, however, was some of the comments I’ve heard from our intelligentsia, tutored by the School of Resentment that rules college campuses, leftism’s final frontier.
“So this means that Pacquiao will be richer while a lot of poor people are hungry. Life is so unfair!”
“He should give all his earnings to the poor. He owes it to his country. He should only keep what his family needs.”
Manny received at least $6 million from the “Dream Match.” He deserved every cent of it and all his other earnings. He worked hard, he trained hard, he fought hard. He was focused, he was disciplined, and so he excelled. Life for him and others like him who achieve excellence in their careers is fair. If there is one thing that is certain in this world it is this: Greatness is always rewarded.
De La Hoya, who won America’s only boxing gold medal at the 1992 Summer Olympics, previously defeated 17 world champions and won 10 world titles in six different weight classes. Despite being pummeled by Pacman, the Golden Boy will be at least $20 million richer. So far, I haven’t heard any statesider urging Oscar to give his all his money to the poor.
Manny and Oscar were not the only ones who earned oodles of moolah. Their promoters, the MGM Grand, Las Vegas itself, HBO, the hotels and restaurants that broadcast the fight, cable TVs around the world — they all shared the wealth, so to speak. And these establishments employ thousands of individuals who have families. The people, too, who paid good money to see the fight went home thrilled to be a part of a historic sporting spectacle. How do you quantify the satisfaction of a happy customer?
Manny, in any case, owes his country nothing. He brought honor to the P.I. and he will continue to make hefty donations to community groups and charitable organizations back home. We should be grateful for his greatness and generosity. (And “wit.” Asked what Filipino dish he missed the most while training in the states, he replied, “Sashimi.”)
You cannot, in any case, make the lives of the poor better by making the rich poor. They’ve tried that already in such prosperous nations as the Soviet Union, the “people’s democracies” of Eastern Europe, North Korea, Cuba, China under Mao, the Khmer Rouge’s Kampuchea, Vietnam before it implemented its “Doi moi” reforms…
“The politics of envy,” writes syndicated columnist Star Parker, “do not point to the way out of poverty. Character, aspirations, hard work, and freedom do.” Parker was writing about the 2006 movie “The Pursuit of Happyness,” the story of “a poor black man who wasn’t asking why [the rich were] making so much, but wanted to know how he could do it.” One of the pivotal scenes of the film was when Chris Gardner, the true to life character played by Will Smith, met a guy parking his red Ferrari. “What do you do?” he asked the guy. “And how do you do that?” He didn’t say, “How come you’re rich and I’m not?” Instead, he wanted to know how he could be rich, too. He eventually became a millionaire.
There’s a lesson there somewhere.
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