This is not how voters see it. For large numbers of voters the professional classes who staff the bureaucracies, foundations and policy institutes in and around government are themselves a special interest. It is not that evil plutocrats control innocent bureaucrats; many voters believe that the progressive administrative class is a social order that has its own special interests. Bureaucrats, think these voters, are like oil companies and Enron executives: they act only to protect their turf and fatten their purses.
The problem goes even deeper than hostility toward perceived featherbedding and life tenure for government workers. The professionals and administrators who make up the progressive state are seen as a hostile power with an agenda of their own that they seek to impose on the nation.
I can't help but remember, from my pre-retirement days, the number of people I dealt with who were part of the "revolving door" between the military and government, between academia and the government, between Wall Street and the government, etc. It was clear there was a closely-knit "old boys network" that helped each other, that appointed each other to plum jobs within and outside of the government, that saw to it that the children of their friends got into good colleges and got prime jobs when they got out, that covered for each other when things got sticky, that helped get good contracts for their friends, and that help to finance the elections and re-elections of other members of "the club".
And I know (because I went to one of the in-group prep schools, though I was not part of the in-group) that they think of themselves as an elite; different, and better, and smarter, than the average citizen of this country, and that their allegiance is more to their own group than to any abstract idea like a nation. They themselves, of course, would be horrified by this description of themselves - it would not match their own perceptions of themselves as wise, generous, far-seeing leaders dedicated to the common good.
So I think the paragraphs quoted above are not only accurate, but that the public perception is matched by reality.
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