Together Forever ChangingPhilip j. Rappa
Together Forever Changing
An Article
Fear and Loathing in America
The
time has come to take our collective heads out of our bunkers and allow the
light of day to remove the pall of shadows obscuring our perspective.
It’s time to seriously examine the mitigating results of using a
constant state of fear to rule what’s left of our democracy.
Each new terrorist alert has wreaked havoc on my inner child, forcing me
to reprise that careening free-fall down a rabbit hole experienced by
Good
citizens, be mindful of each new revelation spotlighting the latest miscreant to
be added to a cavalcade of characters of elected officials, bankers, auditors,
brokers, lawyers and corporate boards. The
“Code of Honor” of this pernicious unholy alliance of individuals can be
summed up in two words: ambition and greed.
Confidence
games and other flagrant schemes such as Enron and Global Crossing are possible
with the generous assistance from the roguish perps found in both parties of
congress. The Peter Principle, the
theory that all members of an organization will eventually be promoted to a
level at which they are no longer competent to do their job, is the life
force of these shills on the hill. (Our lesson here is; “not only cream rises
to the top”.) Their latest insult
is, “Campaign Finance Reform”, which has as much sincerity as a note from a
philanderer to a pregnant woman confined to a home for unwed mothers.
Yet, there is not a guilty one to be found among them.
If we hung a huge mirror in front of this august body of representatives
there would be no reflection at all – now that is truly the meaning of
transparency.
Today’s
scandals in our financial markets had their auspicious beginnings sowed during a
time known as “Morning in
With
the demise of the “Glass-Steagall Act” of the 1930’s and the destruction
of the firewall of regulations separating the banking, brokerage and insurance
industries, (which was accomplished in the 1990’s), it has taken less than
twenty years for these mask-less bandits to set up history to repeat itself.
Deregulation
has spawned a mindset of arrogance, duplicitousness is the game plan.
False valuations, bogus deals and the massaging of numbers are nothing
more than egregious acts colorfully described as fiendishly clever and artful in
nature. “The New Deal”,
“stakeholder capitalism” (When employee and community interests were
protected, when regulations protected ordinary citizens from the excesses of
capitalism.) is finished, replaced by our latest idiom known as “The New
Economy”.
As
the month of March approaches, three thousand underpaid and understaffed
employees of the S.E.C. (Security Exchange Commission)
will take on the daunting responsibility to examine the balance sheets of
over one thousand mutual funds and over ten thousand stocks.
Burdened at the same time to keep abreast of the latest machinations of
over a half a million brokers and those of investment bankers.
With the stench of scandal still permeating the halls of congress, no
longer is anyone threatening to slash the budget of the S.E.C., nor is anyone on
the hill offering to increase it. It
seems to me, increasing the S.E.C. budget should be part of the “Homeland
Security” pie. The bad news for the investing public is that the S.E.C. has
lost many qualified individuals with years of knowledge and experience in the
ways of seeking out either clarity in financial reporting or fraud.
So, as the Ides of March approaches, let us take our cue from our leadership, “Let’s go shopping”. Better yet, as Peggy Lee once sang, “If that’s all there is my friends, than let’s keep dancing.”
©
Philip J. Rappa
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