THE GREEDY ONES
We are in the midst of a flood of disclosures of mismanagement at high levels in American business and industry. It could not have hit at a worse time, because the perception of business ethics is at an all-time low.
At the time when we need more public confidence in and loyalty to the CEO echelon of American business firms we are inundated with stories of gross ineptitude in handling the affairs of ranging from sheer incompetence to outright
dishonesty.
That’s putting it all mildly, too. The vast majority of the public mind thinks of these transgressions as plain old lying, cheating and stealing. To call it by any other name is to set aside Truth in favor of momentary
convenience. Indications , are, at the moment, that our elected official will see it as a serious matter to track down and reveal further scandals in business and to bite political bullets a bit and deal with offenders quickly, honestly
and completely. Not to do so is to invite voter distrust in the elected officials as well, and rightly so.
The field of accusations is growing and the latest edition of “Fortune Magazine” pictures several such “greedy” individuals about whom most of us have never heard, and, in so doing, they push the known
offenders ‘way down the list of miscreants. Let’s hope none of them get lost in the flood of followers.
I hear voices saying, not only should the offenders against common decency and honesty, be punished, but that their ill-gotten acquisitions - running into millions and even billions -of dollars, - should, whenever
possible be returned to the pilfered firms, to stockholders therein or individuals - workers, for instance - who suffered severe losses because of company policy. It would appear that we have ahead of us a mountainous array of legal
proceedings which likely continued former years. Some more recently named “greedy ones” may think of this as an advantage which gives them a chance of being either overlooked or snowed under in the avalanche of legal
procedures certain to be set in motion by any attempt to stop such widespread theft.
There is a good chance that this will set the tone of the upcoming Congressional elections and of the next Presidential election as well. This clean-up is going to take a while. It will dwarf the clean up campaigns of
the past and make them seem to be kindergarten “pick up and put away” time by comparison.
The big question right now...for all of us... is: Are we ready to deal with a problem of this magnitude?
The problem is just being “stated” at the moment. Are we ready to face up to the crushing enormity of such crimes against our society?
A.L.M. August 14, 2002 [c468ds]
