On the Wealth of Nations, on the D.C. Subway

Katherine Mangu-Ward | June 5, 2009

From the indispensable D.C. summer intern tracking blog, Spotted:

"Two red-badge toting interns sharing a copy of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations ... Cliffs Notes version. I won't bother elaborating further.

This tidbit, and every other entry on the site, is meant to reinforce the city's full-time inmates' (totally justified) hatred of interns, especially badge-wearing Capitol Hill jerklets.

But this doesn't strike me as so bad. It means that there are still folks who arrive in D.C all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed who are quickly shamed or in some way publicly humiliated for not knowing what's between the covers of The Wealth of Nations.

The story seems a bit off, though, since there actually doesn't seem to be an official Cliffs Notes version of Wealth of Nations (just a chapter in The Worldly Philosophers). Maybe they were reading P.J. O'Rourke's version? If so, this little tidbit actually raises my opinion of D.C. interns.