March 18, 2012, - 3:52 pm

She Said What?: Pretentious Liberal Fraud Quote of the Day

By Debbie Schlussel

Because I’m interested in art, architecture, and design, I usually enjoy reading the regular Friday Wall Street Journal article on the unusual or remarkable homes of mostly wealthy people.  The feature runs in the Friday Journal section.  But this Friday, the Journal skipped that in favor of an article on the rising real estate costs in San Francisco fueled by the tech-boom.  That’s not exactly news to anyone paying attention, as the San Francisco area features some of the highest prices per square foot in a home and the most expensive real estate and office space in the nation, even when competing head-to-head with New York.  It’s a phenomenon that’s existed for more than a decade.


Gagan & Jasmin Arneja: Crusaders Against Gordon Gekko-Esque Homes in Their $1.5 Million Home

What also isn’t news is the arrogance and pretentiousness of the liberal tech-boomer hypocrites trying to pretend that they are better than capitalists and capitalism and remain non-materialistic/non-one-percenters when they spend a gazillion dollars for a tiny shack.  It’s typical limousine liberal BS, but it’s all the more jarring and ridiculous when you read quotes like the one from Jasmin Arneja, a fellow traveler in liberal fakery and phoniness:

Twenty-two people, including employees of Facebook, Zynga, Google and Pixar, battled for the home. The winning offer was $1.5 million—40% higher than the asking price. The house had a great view, but it was only 1,800 square feet and came with an old kitchen which, like most of the interior, was covered in 1970s plywood paneling. Seen from the curb, there’s hardly any house at all—just a one-car garage and gate leading to small front courtyard.


The inconspicuousness was part of the attraction, said Jasmin Arneja, 42, who bought the two-bedroom house with her husband Gagan, 40, a software engineer at a networking start-up. “It’s the antithesis to these outrageous bizarre Gordon Gekko-esque houses. It just incorporates so much of our values,” said Ms. Arneja, who runs a philanthropic advisory firm.

Hilarious. “Gordon Gekko” is code for successful capitalism, which she’s attacking. Yup, this pretender-ette, who just paid $1.5 million for an out-of-date shack, 40% above the asking price in the most inflated real estate market in America, is lecturing us about how she’s not like Gordon Gekko? Seriously? With a straight face? Spending $1.5 million on an 1,800 square foot house, 40% above the asking price–no way that’s greedy or materialistic, right?

Um, the difference between this chick and Gordon Gekko is that he acknowledged that greed is good and didn’t pretend he was the opposite as he spent an outrageous $1.5 million for a relatively tiny home. Just what exactly are this woman’s “values” that are incorporated by wasting $1.5 million on a tiny home? Seems to me she has exactly Gekko’s values, but he (the ’80s “Wall Street” movie character played by Michael Douglas) is more honest about them. She’s as much of a capitalist as he is. Yes, judging from the photo above, the view is spectacular, and the reason for the high price. But that’s what Gordon Gekkos do–they pay a lot for nice things, including tiny homes with beautiful vistas. She’s not anti-Gordon Gekko, as she’d like to pretend. She’s a mini Gordon Gekko-ess minus the style and personality. Someone’s been getting high on too much Michael Moore.

Even more funny is that this woman makes her living advising the “Gordon Gekkos” of the area how to give away their money. Without their Gordon Gekko-esque behavior, they wouldn’t have money to give away to charity, and she wouldn’t have a job or the wherewithal to afford a $1.5 million home. Even more likely, those same Gordon Gekkos are the ones who invest in start-ups so her husband can have a job as a software engineer and carry her on her “philanthropy advisor” salary so she can live in this expensive hovel and deride capitalists and businessmen who live in expense houses that are far nicer. Frankly, those who have the Gordon Gekko-esque homes Ms. Arneja derides are simply smarter. They probably spent not much more to get far more house than what she got.

By the way, I looked them up and couldn’t find any political donations by the Arnejas. But how much you wanna bet they voted for Obama and will vote for him again in November?

And so I give you Gagan and Jasmin Arneja, the lefty hypocrites and anti-capitalist frauds of the day.

You may now return to sanity and common sense.




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34 Responses

Now you understand one of the many reasons why I bailed on the Democrats.

Class resentment.

Patrick AKA DetroitRight on twitter on March 18, 2012 at 4:52 pm

LOL!!! Just like Michael Moore Left his million dollar digs yesterday to pal around with the “Defecate On Wall Street” protesters who wanted to disrupt the St. Patricks day activities!

Hollywood on March 18, 2012 at 4:54 pm

Keep her fanny out of the South and on the Left Coast. The South is G-d’s country.

Confederate South on March 18, 2012 at 5:22 pm

Let the world extol the virtues of Facebook
whose founder is an admitted criminal and
has created a hackers paradise.
A billionaire criminal enterprise that
governments resource for data.
Hopefully Obama will join his terrorist
brethren after being swept away.

Commander Zsvartz on March 18, 2012 at 7:52 pm

Jasmin is essentially a parasitic growth that would not exist without the people she so heartily scolds. As for hubby, he would not be earning enough to pay for a studio in the Bay Area without capitalists. Jasmin’s choice of housing also belies any real modesty existing in her life.

Essentially, Jasmin is a human tick.

Worry01 on March 18, 2012 at 8:07 pm

I JUST LOVE your totally made-up anti-Liberal warfare.

You looked for evidence and found not a smidgeon of any that they’re even Democrats, let alone liberals. Instead, you found that she works WITH high-wealth individuals (probably without discriminating regards their politics, either), despite the obvious tilt towards conservative individuals in that profession.

But that didn’t stop you! Way to go to energize the political warfare between libs and cavemen!

Walt French on March 18, 2012 at 8:29 pm

    I love your hair Mr. French!

    Skunky on March 18, 2012 at 8:40 pm

      Skunky, maybe we should take up a collection to help him purchase a rug. It could be attached with super glue or carpet staples. Why bother with Bosley? 😉

      Worry01 on March 19, 2012 at 3:32 am

    “It’s the antithesis to these outrageous bizarre Gordon Gekko-esque houses. It just incorporates so much of our values,” said Ms. Arneja, who runs a philanthropic advisory firm.”

    How is this woman made up? Do you need more examples of this Frenchy? They are not really hard to find. Michael Moore is a millionaire who like to impersonate a blue collar worker. Or, how about the head honcho at The Nation, Katrina vanden Heuvel. Check out her digs sometime, if you even make it through security. lol

    Worry01 on March 19, 2012 at 3:28 am

    Walt, if they are Conservative Christians, show me proof and I’ll send you a Ruth Chris gift certificate for $100.00, care of Debbie. If not, you send me one. Care to put money where Liberal mouth is? Since your last name represents your courage factor, I’ll think not. Debbie has my home e-mail. I’ll wait.

    Occam's Tool on March 22, 2012 at 12:14 am

My favourite (and yet at the same time most annoying) thing I started to feel hosed about by Liberals when I was an uninformed one was that even though they hated religious peeps with a passion (I never did) I soon discovered in my early 20s that they were the photo to the negative of the holy rollers. What they hated most about the holy rollers reflected what they hated most about themselves…they were just opposite colours.

Liberal hypocrisy still gets stuck in my craw. I can’t stand it and love to point it out.

This fraudulent git prolly thinks some animals are more equal than others.

(DS there is a huge article in Boston Globe Magazine (Sunday supplement to the newspaper) on Grover Norquist. It enlightened me about how taken by his Palestinian wife he is and I found out he has something in common with John Boehner (being a weeper). I didn’t know he was a local boy. Jeez)

Skunky on March 18, 2012 at 8:37 pm

Confederate South:

Actually, the Bible – both testaments – rails against Gordon Gekkos. (A good example of a Gordon Gekko in the OT is the king of Tyre in Isaiah 23. As far as the New Testament, King Herod is a good Tyre figure. Revelation 18:9-20 talks about more Gekkos, and James 2 tells us not to seek their company.) So did those prominent in early Christianity such as John Chrysostom. As did the 16th and 17th century Protestants that created capitalism in the first place, such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Edwards and Cotton Mather. Gordon Gekkos are the result of rejecting the religious morality that was meant to restrain the excesses of capitalism, and replacing it with the humanistic individualism that was the result of the Enlightenment, Darwinism etc. where man’s chief end is the glorification of himself.

I have no problem with capitalism. It certainly beats such alternatives as socialism and feudalism. But capitalism works better WITHOUT Gordon Gekkos. I wish more conservatives – especially religious conservatives – were willing to stand up and say so. Pious folks in times past had superior motives for making money and otherwise achieving material success than greed, which Proverb 15:27 says brings only trouble, and 1 Timothy 6:10 says is the root of all evil. It would be far better to have your attitude towards money and success shaped by the Puritan theologians of old than by modernist thought.

Gerald on March 18, 2012 at 8:58 pm

“But the gentrification is far from complete. A surge in violence between feuding gangs called the Norteños and Sureños claimed two lives in less than 24 hours in the Mission in August, and there was a shooting in front of a coffee shop. Noe Valley saw a rash of sexual assaults; residents there have also reported attempted carjackings and armed robberies.

“The key word is coexistence,” said David Campos, a member of the city’s Board of Supervisors representing the Mission and Bernal Heights.”

The above was also interesting to me. Who does David Campos think he’s foolin’? “Coexistence”? That is pure BS. IF the gentrification continues (and it seems like it is full steam ahead) those dirtbag gangs will be pushed out by $$$$ coming in and that part I love.

Why should dirt-bag gangs who prolly come from poor, single-mother homes on the gubmint dole have the power over the neighbourhood? Push them back so all the poor dirt-bags can live in the same disgusting dump sh**hole.

I’ll never understand why Liberals get all agro and PC about gentrification. Even in my Liberal days a part of Cambridge (between MIT and Harvard University) went through a first phase of gentrification and I could barely wait. And as I predicted that part of town became more tenable. Now almost 20 years later it’s about to go through a 2nd phase to make it even more upscale and the local Liberal rag was boo-hooing it all over again.

Even then I thought the “earthy crunchies” were out of their minds not being behind the gentrification. I work in that area a few times a year and I am looking forward to the 2nd phase because the place is like another planet and can use an upscale enema!

Skunky on March 18, 2012 at 9:06 pm

HeHe! Those Libtard Beardo hipster would have been beat to death with bare fists if they had tried to disrupt the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade!!

RichieRich on March 18, 2012 at 10:06 pm

Gerald
One of my favorite priests gave an excellent sermon at the Traditional Latin Mass this afternoon. Quotes: “Capitalism is not evil in and of itself.” Two examples of this are the wedding feast at Canaan where Jesus turned water in wine and then the time when Jesus fed 5,000 people with 5 loaves and 2 fishes.
Jesus had to go into hiding in the mountains for a brief period of time after the loaves and fishes because the people wanted to make him into an earthly king which was not his desire.
Second Vatican Council was all about bringing Social Justice into the Catholic Church. Second Vatican Council was also one of the biggest known failures to mankind.
Social justice was one of the biggest topics of the 1960’s and the worst diseases that could ever have happened in the United States and the world at that time.
Unfortunately, universities, clergymen, and the media are enamored with this cow dung.

Skunky…Thanks many times over about the book Coloring the News by William McGowan. I enjoy reading good conservative books.

Confederate South on March 18, 2012 at 10:36 pm

    I’m so glad you enjoyed it CS. It’s a lost gem and it really dismantles the worst of Liberal lies quite well. It’s one of those books that comes and goes quickly because the Obama-media (even though it was out pre-Obama-Putin) won’t have it.

    Just like “Deconstructing Obama”. Another one lost in the ether.

    When “Colouring The News” came out I was able to speak with the author on Howie Carr’s local show. I had just finished it and I asked him if he was being ignored by the Liberal media and he said yes. After that the book died quickly but it is always a favourite of mine. Should have been a blockbuster. Instead he became a victim of what that book warns about.

    Skunky on March 18, 2012 at 10:53 pm

Hi Debbie. I too am annoyed by wealthy liberals, whom I consider the lowest form of liberal. But my real complaint is waiters who don’t write down orders. I had dinner with three fellow Jews at a moderately expensive place tonite. We each ordered an entree straight off the menu and two of us had nonalcoholic drinks. No salads, no appetizers, no special requests. Yet our waiter Mr. Cool had to come back two minutes later to confirm one of the entrees and botched one of the drinks. That means he messed up 1/3rd of a simple order. I don’t get why managers let this go on. Waiters typically botch memorized orders and it discourages me right off the bat from even asking a question let alone making any special requests. And this mainly happens at expensive places. At Ruby Tuesday the 24 year old girls write stuff down. I won’t even get into the hostesses who always take you to the worst table available. That seems to be an industry standard. I’m not particularly hard to please, but I personally declined the first two tables offered us in a relatively empty restaurant. One was in a wind tunnel and the other was by the service area. I guess the toilet tables were all taken. And then they give themselves an automatic 18% tip including a tip on tax. Debbie, I genuinely prefer eating at home, although I like Jewish places due to the interesting forms of humanity on display.

A1 on March 18, 2012 at 10:40 pm

Gerald, I’m a Christian conservative.

I think you are off base on your view of wealth. You seem to wish to impose some higher standards on wealthy people because you just have this notion that wealth is inherently evil. Why do wealthy people have to have this “superior” motive for earning money from their hard work? Many wealthy people do have wealth from superior motives such as hard work.

Providing jobs for people is a superior motive. Contributing money in taxes is a superior motive.

Quit trying to use The Bible to justify your class envy and jealousy. Having money is no sin. (And, no, I’m not rich.)

Jeff_W on March 18, 2012 at 10:58 pm

The demand, rather than the prices, for Bay Area homes, particularly in the city, is what shock me. What was the main attraction about this house of Ms Arneja? If she wanted inconspicuous, she could have bought something just across the bridge in Oakland, Berzerkley or Hayward. Without paying a fortune for it.

Main problems in the Bay Area is that all real estate is expensive, and the demands in good screwl districts just drives costs up even more. Whenever my wife & I watch HGTV, the spaciousness of houses elsewhere in the country just jumps @ us. Too bad the tech industry is still mostly concentrated here.

Infidel on March 19, 2012 at 12:38 am

    Infidel,
    Lots of Tech in Dallas Texas (area). You can get a big home in a nice school district for a decent price. No State Income Tax. For the $1.5 million the geniuses spent for a condo in SF you could get a huge mansion in a suburb or a very nice home 2 to 3 times the size of their place (1,800 sq ft) in the most elite neighborhood of Highland Park.

    Ken on March 19, 2012 at 3:08 am

Wonder how much the “makeover” of this house will eventually cost. Probably more than the cost of the house in order to make it liveable for your everyday limousine liberal.

CornCoLeo on March 19, 2012 at 1:31 am

You are right Debbie. They are hypocrites and worse than Gordan Gekko because he was honest about what he was. They disparage what gives them the ability to live the Liberal Elite Life. They are Reality Impaired, like most Liberals. They are happy they overpaid for an overpriced place with a nice view. Gekko would have found a better place for less money.

Ken on March 19, 2012 at 2:58 am

Awesome take-down of this pretentious, phony, jackass, Debbie.

DS_ROCKS! on March 19, 2012 at 7:59 am

Since the subject of hypocrisy was brought up & Walt French made his Jackanape like vacuous statement: “But that didn’t stop you! Way to go to energize the political warfare between libs and cavemen”! I would like to point out the blatant, obvious Liberal hypocrisy Mr. French himself so prominently just displayed with his “caveman” description of Conservatives. Would “I just stepped in it” be an appropriate response for you Mr. French? 🙂

Hollywood on March 19, 2012 at 8:19 am

Thomas Sowell has written quite a bit on the cost of housing in San Francisco and how it’s no accident that certain individuals (or groups) can’t afford to live there. Quite interesting regarding the hypocrisy of liberals and their call for diversity.

Blayne on March 19, 2012 at 9:21 am

debbie, can you please do a piece on the unlamented jew-hater pope shneouda?

joey on March 19, 2012 at 9:37 am

Of course what everyone should do is buy property on the other side of the fault line. San Francisco is built partially on garbage and fully on liberal illusions. Neither lasts very long for a foundation.

Jonathan Gartner on March 19, 2012 at 9:54 am

You want a view? Hang a poster, or paint it.

Geesh.

Michelle on March 19, 2012 at 10:33 am

So…out-dated, 70s, cheap, wood paneling is suddenly the symbol of some deeply held social/political value?

Don’t most of us working class folks rip up the 70s orangey-yellowy-brown semi-shag carpet so we can reclaim & recondition 100 year old hardwood floors or replace the old carpet with a nice, long-lasting Berber?

And that paneling? Tear it off and either repair old plaster, then paper/texture/paint or go all out and take a sledgehammer to the lathe and plaster, then test our marriage by learning how to dry wall together? : )

I’m just a mid-west farm girl, so I probably have a completely warped view of what property-ownership is all about and why it matters to create property value in one’s nice family home. It’s never been some sort of political statement for most Americans, no matter how much liberals need it to be one for their narratives to work about us neanderthal knuckle-draggers.

Note to libs: What I drive, eat, wear, read, etc are also NOT political statements. Never have been. Never gonna be.

Aurora on March 19, 2012 at 10:35 am

Bravo! DS. Well done.

FrenchKiss on March 19, 2012 at 5:25 pm

Isn’t a wealthy liberal kind of an oxymoron, unless you are in the elderly ever shrinking minority of old FDR voters, or you already have a job in the gas guzzling democratic machine driven by Obama, and one confused Jew.

Ron Wolf aka "Columbo" on March 19, 2012 at 6:10 pm

HaHaHa,Debbie I love your take on this article. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and I meet many of these limousine liberals. They try to act like they are against wealth, expensive big homes, etc. but they are no different than the other wealthy residents they deride. What ticks me off is that these people have recently passed several bonds and parcel taxes that have raised property taxes that are making people that have live here for a long time, start struggling to pay these taxes. These limo liberals are all spending money in the local radio and televisions saying that these taxes are needed to keep California schools ahead of the pack. I laugh because California spends is the highest or one of the highest per pupil and yet we still need to import engineers of techonology from India, China, etc. Anyway, these long time residents that were living in these neighborhoods are on fixed incomes and many find it difficult to pay these property taxes. I told a friend of my father how these new bonds and parcel taxes came about and he mentioned that the local residents passed them. I noticed that many are newbies that moved in due to the tech firms that have hired them. Many also leave when either the tech company lay workers off or move from this tax repressive state. Meanwhile the bonds and taxes are still in the books.

Many people ask, why do the long time residents leave but at age 80 or 90 would you want to move to another area that you grew up in? Debbie, I have heard stories of how Detroit is losing people but unfortunately we do not have that problem. We have these transplants come here, raise the prices of everything and then when the gravy train is gone, they pack up and leave.

Mario on March 19, 2012 at 6:20 pm

Hilarious Debbie – I love when you call out the fraudsters!

MRobs on March 20, 2012 at 1:50 pm

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