“The Goldman folks have no soul, selling crap as gold and claiming no responsibility.”
— my Tweet on the Goldman hearings from earlier today
The few moments of today’s Senate hearing on financial reforms and the role Goldman Sachs played was, to say the least, surreal. Goldman officials appeared defiant, which just underscores the need to rein in an industry that no longer has much to do with creating economic security for the country.
My column this week, which should go live tomorrow, talks about the gutting of the regulatory system across the corporate world — not just finance, but mining, air safety, consumer goods, food and drugs — and how it has allowed big business to function as if it was the Cosa Nostra, acting with impunity.
It is easy to blame George W. Bush for this. His administration was probably more aggressive than any before in dismantling the regulatory edifice. But that only tells a small part of the story. Every presidential administration beginning with Jimmy Carter’s in the late 1970s has stripped away some portion of the regulatory apparatus, so each bears some responsibility for the mess we now find ourselves in.
But blame only goes so far. It is time to reverse the trend, to protect average Americans from the predatory nature of international business — and the only way we can do this is via strong regulations designed to level the playing field, to keep business honest. I don’t say this lightly — I am generally skeptical of large concentrations of power, but I have a greater fear at the moment of unchecked corporate power.
We used to understand this — Teddy Roosevelt busted the trusts and even Dwight Eisenhower warned against the growing military-industrial complex. Barack Obama told us he understood, as well, but it has become clear that he is not interested in challenging the status quo anymore than anyone else working in Washington or any of the state capitals.
If we hope to safe our environment, our economy, our democracy, we need to stop paying lip sevice to the legalized crime that occurs on Wall Street everyday and do something about it.
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- Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.
Hank Kalet 