Corporation Bashing
Molly Ivins has a new essay, Mourning In America, with an interesting anecdote in it. I don't mean the rotting-chicken-around-the-dog's-neck, though that is certainly interesting, too. The story I'd like to underscore is the one about Merck and Vioxx, and how just maybe they knew their product was dangerous but they kept on selling it, and how the Bush Administration thinks that's just fine.
In short, we have a toothless regulatory agency in the pocket of the industry it is supposed to patrol. We have an administration-wide contempt for science and plain facts. And the allegation against the folks at Merck is that they were making such enormous profits on a drug that killed people that when they knew or suspected it was killing people, they kept right on selling it. When the information that Merck had known for a long time about Vioxx and heart attacks became public, the company's stock fell by 9.6 percent.
That's the system George W. Bush stands for: where a corporation can knowingly kill people for profit and, when it finally comes out, everyone knows the penalties will be so light the company doesn't even lose a tenth of its worth. Hey, just a little bump in the road.
Yesterday, a right-winged commenter on this blog called corporation-bashing a "bizarre pathology", since they are "the source of almost all wealth." Granted, they are that. But like individuals, they lie, cheat, steal and sometimes even kill, and like individuals they should be held responsible for their actions.
posted by Chris @ 11/04/2004 11:48:00 AM
2 comments
2 Comments:
If it was a corporation benefitting from a Democratic initiative it would be called a boondoggle. PoTAYto PoTAHto. I don't hear the anit-boondoggler's bashing on Halliburton right now. One man's boondoggle is another man's industrial-military complex. Both add up to tax money spent inefficiently.
Separately, the way our government is setup is completely ridiculous. Almost every government regulatory agency is run by the people who are being regulated. The conflict of interest is truly ridiculous. Our government agencies aren't being run for the people. Unless, of course, if you think 'for the people' translates directly to 'generating business for corporations which equals wealth in the U.S.'.
I honestly believe that the next big reorganization of government should be the reconstruction of regulatory agencies of industries. The people in this country don't have the bankroll to compete with the corporatioins for control in the government agencies the way they are currently set up.
I don't think it will ever happen. But it should.
I second the remark by WnotW about the regulatory agencies and the corporations being hand-in-hand: it's true. If you work in the regulatory agency, you hope to get a nice cushy job in the corporation by coming to it with a thorough knowlege of how the agency works. This is the way it always ends up, and it doesn't matter who the president is.
And the whole thing backfires: anything goes wrong, and the company can say, "Hey, the regulatory agency approved it!" I don't know if that keeps them from going to jail, but it might.
Since corporations are like people, just pass the laws, and prosecute them.
Bill Gates cannot get away with murder any more than you or I can. OK, O.J. Simpson can, and it's just as much of an outrange, but that's a different story.
I think the moral of the story is that you have to work constantly to eradicate corruption. We must be doing something right; we're not like Mexico. So let's do more of that.
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