Corporate Crime

[SHRED]

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When are we going to wake up and elect people who will represent all of us, not just the uber-moneyed few?

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The Decriminalization of Corporate Crime
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080329_kutler_march_29_in_the_wake_of_deregulation/
Posted on Mar 29, 2008

By Stanley Kutler

~SNIP~

The dismantling of government programs and regulation with the concurrent growth in privatization goes beyond the present regime. The Bush administration merely has implemented a radical extension of a process long under way. For 30 years, so-called centrist Democrats, anxious to shed any scarlet mark of liberalism, have eagerly sought consensus and accommodation with conservatives, largely by adopting their creed of small, cheap government—government that would fuel the private sector. Thus the seduction of “deregulation” and the accompanying creed of “privatization.” How and why they abandoned a faith that had served them and the nation so well and for so long is a mystery.

The irony is that the failures and crimes of Richard Nixon so discredited, so debilitated the ideology of their opponents. Anyway, the result has been the prominence of the Democratic Leadership Council, the crippling compromises of the Clinton administration, and the spectacle of Good Old Joe Lieberman accompanying John McCain on his foreign tour—as what, vice president in waiting? Secretary of state-designate? Sancho Panza?

We always have recognized the place of the “Fourth Branch” of government—meaning the plethora of alphabet-soup agencies with an admixture of executive, legislative and judicial functions, which exist largely to regulate the economy. Now, it appears, 20th century political science is mostly consigned to the dustbin of history. As always, “reform” and “change” have had their unexpected consequences.

The unwarranted search of private passport files raises important issues for the future of government and our familiar constitutional order. Juvenal’s timeless conundrum will not go away: Quis custodet ipsos custodes?—Who will guard these self-same guardians? What is the future of all this privatization? Will we insist on the accountability—the checking and the balancing—which has been the hallmark of our constitutional system? Or will we continue the administration’s weapon of choice: a blanket policy of legal immunization, such as is enjoyed by Blackwater?

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080329_kutler_march_29_in_the_wake_of_deregulation/


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