President Obama has called income inequality the “defining challenge of our time.” Many progressives blame the market economy and doubt John F. Kennedy’s view that “a rising tide lifts all boats.” In 2011 Mr. Obama chided those who believe “the market will take care of everything.” It’s a “simple theory,” he said. “It fits well on a bumper sticker. Here’s the problem: It doesn’t work. It’s never worked.”

When Condoleezza Rice was growing up in Birmingham, Ala. her parents — both educators who never made more than $60,000 between them — taught her to never be a victim. They told her she’d have to work twice as hard. But if she did, there would be no limits on what she could accomplish.

‘You,’ a character in Ossie Davis’s 1961 play “Purlie Victorious” says to another, “are a disgrace to the Negro profession.” The line recurs to me whenever I see Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson making perfunctory rabble-rousing remarks in Ferguson, Mo., Madison, Wis., current-day Selma, Ala., or any other protest scene where their appearance, like Toni Morrison on a list of honorary-degree recipients, has become de rigueur.

In jumping around through the blogosphere last night, I came across this quote from Paul Samuelson, in an interview he did in 2009 with Conor Clarke.