Kiliaen Van Rensselaer has a breezy attitude about this current financial apocalypse, but not because he's the fabulously wealthy direct descendant of the founder of the Dutch West India Company; it's because he knows that he's a self-made man, and he knows that while recessions are ruinous for the poors, they are only setbacks for plutocrats. Like his own family, for instance! Kiliaen (pictured with unpopular socialite Olivia Palermo, who we hear he used to date) is confident that the world judges him on his actions alone. Foolish rich people, when will you learn not to be profiled by the Observer? Spencer Morgan will just hang you with your own quotes:
“I think these things are cyclical, and great families survive if they’re intelligent. And again, if they have a lot of members of the family who are actually out there trying to make something of themselves,” he said. “These things are horrible and they destroy wealth and they destroy opportunity for a lot of people, but hopefully great families who have more than one person who have done some great things can continue to preserve capital and build new wealth—so when something like this happens, you’re not destroyed, you’re set back.” Then Mr. Van Rensselaer and Ms. Menniken hopped in a chauffeured SUV and headed down Park Avenue.
Also his model girlfriend dislikes the word "moist." [NYO; Pic via NY Social Diary]