We piled on a little. Frum pushes back:
The woman is perceiving something true. Over half a human lifetime, Washington has shifted from a city whose status hierarchy was dominated by official rank to one whose status hierarchy is determined almost entirely by money. A US senator is a smaller deal in the Washington of 2012 than his or her predecessor of 1972; a visiting billionaire a much bigger deal. Not that the senator has sunk to zero; not that the billionaire would not have been important in 1972; but the ratios have changed—and changed really quite dramatically.
I also think that talking face to face often defuses polarization more than tweets and blog posts and soundbites. In so far as that happens less now in Washington, Sally's right to worry.
The Dish 