End the Sleaze Now

The very highly paid CEO of HP resigned last Friday, as he was caught doing something unethical - viz., he seems to have caused HP to pay a "contractor" for work not performed. Guess what ? The "contractor" is a beautiful blonde lady, part-time actress. She claims no hanky panky was involved, but it really doesn't matter if Herr Hurd scored or was just trying to. He cheated the company.

Here is a ultra wealth member of the Ruling Class, caught as so many of them have done and are doing. Cheating on life. Recent ethics charges against Charlie Rangel and Maxine Waters, who are long term members of the DC ruling class, show another side of the rackets of all these ruling class knaves. [aside: can a woman be a "knave" or is that a male term ? Knavette sounds dumb, so I'll use knave as a gender-neutral term.]

Example of gross unfairness: Hurd keeps his huge, multimillion severance pay. If a midlevel person had done that, do you think that person would get 1 cent in severance ?

A congressman loses an election .. and goes on to become a $5 million a year lobbyist. [e. g., Tom Daschle]. CEOs love to cut pay for workers at all levels ... EXCEPT the top.

The Republicans seem to be in the pocket of the corporate ruling class. They now stupidly talk about cutting corporate taxes. Remarkably out of touch with reality on the streets, no ?

The Democrats seem to be in the pocket of the DC ruling class, public employee unions and trial lawyers. They defend pay and benefits for public employees far in excess of the private sector, who are the taxpayers supporting the government.

What is to be done ?

First, vote for only honest candidates (assuming you can find one).

Second, Americans need to look around the world and perhaps learn something from other nations who have come through crisis. Germany was leveled in WW II. Now it's rather prosperous, and has done much better than the US in recovering from this downturn. Why ? We must stop being myopic. We like to make fun of other nations for not adopting some of our ideas & culture. Why should we not adopt ideas of other nations that are proven to work ?

Third, apply social pressure. Why don't we ostracize CEOs, corporate people who are needlessly & ruthlessly laying off workers ? Why not demonstrate (and support demonstrations) against them ? Expose them for their tyranny.

Fourth, speak out. Write reasoned comments to online articles. Join some organizations. A great American cultural trait is voluntarism - joining organizations and pitching in to help. Do something yourself besides griping. If many people do it, it can make a huge difference.

Word of the Day

"Percipient" - adjective and noun [$10]
Percipient means (adjective) 1. able to perceive, conscious; 2. discerning, observant; (noun) a person who perceives, esp. something outside the range of senses.
Sentence: Americans need to be more percipient in two ways: (I) recognizing sleaze in the Ruling Class, and (II) recognizing that what works well in other nations might work well here.