Saturday, July 08, 2006
Obituary of Ken Lay As Commentwore on poputonian's observations on the Aspen paper's Obit, at Hullabaloo
The longer this goes on the more convincing it is that what we are seeing is a ruling class- political, corporate, media - which holds to absolutely no values except the accumulation of wealth to itself. There are very few sins that a rich person can commit that will make them unrespectable except advocating the rights and welfare of the dispossessed. There is no amount of theft, murder, destruction of democracy, etc. that will disqualify someone with enough money from respectability, even sanctity. The media and other bestowers of praise are only the symptom of this in a corruption of meaning and values that goes to the core of American imperial culture.
The longer this goes on the more convincing it is that what we are seeing is a ruling class- political, corporate, media - which holds to absolutely no values except the accumulation of wealth to itself. There are very few sins that a rich person can commit that will make them unrespectable except advocating the rights and welfare of the dispossessed. There is no amount of theft, murder, destruction of democracy, etc. that will disqualify someone with enough money from respectability, even sanctity. The media and other bestowers of praise are only the symptom of this in a corruption of meaning and values that goes to the core of American imperial culture.
Comments:
<< Home
I think it bespeaks the sociopathy and psychopathy of the system and its actors, too. How many people say that serial killers are (generally) nice guys, quiet, and the pillars of their communities...up until someone finds out where the bodies are buried?
If you look at the collateral damage from Enron, you're talking about a crime that had tens of millions of victims. If you count everyone who lost their jobs, their life's savings, their homes, had their lives ruined...and all the people who were aversely affected by the rolling blackouts and subsequent extortion in California, that's tens of millions of people. If you take that further out to people who were indirectly affected by it, that's how many more? An example of an indirect effect would be the then-Premier of Ontario, that sleazebag Mike Harris, using the bullshit rationales for the problems we now know for certain were caused by Enron -- not that those of us who were paying attention knew it was anything other than gamesmanship caused by deregulation/privatisation, mind -- as a political wedge to try to privatise and/or deregulate Ontario's publicly-owned electricity generation and transmission system. ("See, look at California! They don't have enough power because their government regulates the market too tightly and there's no incentive to build more power plants! We almost don't have enough capacity now! We have to do something! Privatise now!" is how the song went...)
Tens, or perhaps even hundreds of millions of people, in at least two countries. If Lay had committed a crime on that scale with weapons, instead of money, he wouldn't have died of a heart attack while waiting to go to Club Fed, he would have died of a heart attack while waiting to go to prison...in the Hague.
IOKIYA white collar criminal, I guess...
If you look at the collateral damage from Enron, you're talking about a crime that had tens of millions of victims. If you count everyone who lost their jobs, their life's savings, their homes, had their lives ruined...and all the people who were aversely affected by the rolling blackouts and subsequent extortion in California, that's tens of millions of people. If you take that further out to people who were indirectly affected by it, that's how many more? An example of an indirect effect would be the then-Premier of Ontario, that sleazebag Mike Harris, using the bullshit rationales for the problems we now know for certain were caused by Enron -- not that those of us who were paying attention knew it was anything other than gamesmanship caused by deregulation/privatisation, mind -- as a political wedge to try to privatise and/or deregulate Ontario's publicly-owned electricity generation and transmission system. ("See, look at California! They don't have enough power because their government regulates the market too tightly and there's no incentive to build more power plants! We almost don't have enough capacity now! We have to do something! Privatise now!" is how the song went...)
Tens, or perhaps even hundreds of millions of people, in at least two countries. If Lay had committed a crime on that scale with weapons, instead of money, he wouldn't have died of a heart attack while waiting to go to Club Fed, he would have died of a heart attack while waiting to go to prison...in the Hague.
IOKIYA white collar criminal, I guess...
Excellent comment, Interrobang.
A lot of the worst criminality goes not only unpunished but unremarked upon because they've set up the laws to make the most obvious thefts from the middle and working class perfectly legal.
The privitiziation scam was and is one of the clearest money grabs in our history, Rumsfeld's fabled "downsizing" of the military in the United States is understandable in no other way. Yet our media, 'scholars' and everyone with an effective voice are silent because they are all a part of the same corrupt system.
I always wondered if Bob Rae wasn't set up to prepare the way for Harris. It seems as if NDP Premiers have had a remarkable amount of bad luck. Maybe too remarkable for belief.
Post a Comment
A lot of the worst criminality goes not only unpunished but unremarked upon because they've set up the laws to make the most obvious thefts from the middle and working class perfectly legal.
The privitiziation scam was and is one of the clearest money grabs in our history, Rumsfeld's fabled "downsizing" of the military in the United States is understandable in no other way. Yet our media, 'scholars' and everyone with an effective voice are silent because they are all a part of the same corrupt system.
I always wondered if Bob Rae wasn't set up to prepare the way for Harris. It seems as if NDP Premiers have had a remarkable amount of bad luck. Maybe too remarkable for belief.
<< Home
