THERE’S A STORE in the wealthy Washington suburb of Bethesda, Maryland, that calls itself “Three Dog Bakery.” I read about it the other day. In addition to offering “pooch pretzels,” “mini beagles,” and other “all-natural pet pastries,” it throws birthday parties for dogs. Rich dog owners (I mean, rich owners of dogs, not owners of rich dogs) bring in their pets and up to 12 of their pets’ pet friends, and the revels begin. Clerks prepare cake and goodie bags for the canine partiers. They sing “Happy Birthday” to the guest-of-honor dog. There are balloons and party favors and gift certificates. It costs a considerable amount of money.
“Three Dog Bakery,” in other words, is a perfect symbol of what everyone has come to call “Clinton-era decadence,” that delirium of tawdry excess that has gripped our nation’s winners in the nineties and beyond, as their stock market portfolios ballooned and their paychecks swelled beyond all reason. The signs of this heedless self-indulgence are everywhere. Just this morning I got a flier for the new Ritz Carlton hotel here in Washington, which offers guests “300-thread-count Frette Egyptian cotton sheets,” “butler-drawn baths,” and “a choice of Mount Harmony herbal soaps, handcut to order.” And down the street from the Ritz is the White House itself, where the first lady, in a new, lushly illustrated, overpriced coffee-table book, boasts of redecorating her mansion in “ruby damask” and “moire silk” and commanding underpaid persons of color to serve elaborate desserts to her and her wealthy guests. Meanwhile, of course, not more than a half mile away, rain pours through the splintered roofs of inner-city schools, abandoned children sleep in rat-infested alleyways, senior citizens cry themselves to sleep from hunger.
