Dear Whiny Republican

Yes. We Democrats hate Donald Trump.

We hated him when he won an election engineered by Republican gerrymandering. 

We hated him when his childish and towering insecurity first reared its ugly head via an indefensible proclamation that more people showed up for his inauguration than Barack Obama's.

We hated him when he refused to share his tax returns. Being possessed of functioning brains, we knew what that meant. And still do.

(Which I hasten to point out, differentiates us from you.)

We hated him when he gave lip service to our men in uniform and then pissed all over a Gold Star mother because her son had brown skin.

We hated him when he mimicked a disabled child at one of his campaign rallies like the puerile middle-school bully he is. And then had the audacity to complain about satirical portrayals of himself and call them mean-spirited.

Seriously? 

We hated him when he neutered the Environmental Protection Agency for the benefit of our corporate parasites, endangering every man, woman and child on Earth in the process.

We hated him when he authored a trillion-dollar giveaway to the one-percent and Google and Exxon and Amazon and Wal-Mart. And we hated him when we realized corporate giants were paying income tax at half the rate of working Americans.

We hated him when he spat on America's allies and embraced our enemies. 

We hated him when he was found to have defrauded would-be students under the ageis of (don't laugh) Trump University.

(You want a world-class oxymoron? There it is.)

We hated him when he was found to have looted his own charity.

And we hated him when he arrogantly and capriciously put the security of domestic elections at risk by soliciting the help of a foreign government to dig up dirt on a presumed opponent in exchange for foreign aid.

Democrats did not provoke this impeachment. Our dislike and derision didn't place a phone call to Ukraine last July. Donald Trump did that all by himself.

Can I assume you're familiar with the expression 'give a man enough rope and he'll hang himself'?

Whine and cry about how Democrats have wanted this since November 8, 2016. You're right. You are so damn fucking right. Hate us for knowing in advance what an incompetent, venal, selfish, toxic bag of shit Donald Trump was going to be as president.

THAT'S WHY WE DIDN'T VOTE FOR HIM!!!

Do you retards get that???

I'm so sorry you're Republican. Like sheep returning from pasture, you know only how to follow the asshole in front of you.

Worse still are his enablers. The spineless, gutless cowards in the House and Senate. Their reflexive, unthinking support of this destructive and dangerous demagogue should have them in front of a firing squad. 

God willing, the political equivalent will present itself next November.

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act

Twenty-some years ago, conservatives were fond of using the phrase “transfer of wealth” to scare the Republican base into voting lest the country be overrun with poor people driving Italian sports cars and buying homes in affluent suburbs.

So it is ironic, then, that our current infestation of Republicans is presiding over that which they wielded as a threat all those years ago.

The latest installment of their ongoing effort to hand the country over to the one-percent is their tax reform, a hastily-written proposal composed in shadow to keep we the people from seeing it for the outrage it is. 

(But not to worry. I have it on good authority that the half-eaten bag of Doritos in your kitchen and that basket of dirty laundry are, for the moment, safe.)

First off is the nearly fifty-percent reduction in the corporate tax rate.

Anyone with even the faintest knowledge of corporate America knows businesses routinely employ armies of tax attorneys to reduce their tax burden. And they succeed, wildly. No company able to keep its head outside its rectum pays the listed rate—none.

This reduction has the added benefit of relieving corporations of that need to keep tax attorneys around, which come to think of it must be frightfully expensive. *sniff*

To further assuage our put-upon corporations, they will be allowed to repatriate their offshore cash reserves to the U.S. at a suggested tax rate of just 10%. To ensure they aren't too inconvenienced by our largesse, they have eight years to pay up. 

To those of you made inconsolable by our immigration policy, which seemingly rewards illegal aliens for not getting caught, please explain to me in excruciating detail how this is different. It is certainly interesting that our pillars of pilferage sit on historic amounts of cash—even despite the strangulating regulation forced upon them by the big, bad—and presumably liberal—government.

Someone is getting screwed, and it doesn't appear to be the folks with the mountain of offshore tender, does it? 

But the biggest, most-lavishly-wrapped gift is a change in the methodology of taxation. Our beleaguered corporations are no longer required to report overseas income, the likely outcome of which will be said cash returning to these shores virtually untaxed.

If the facts aren't horrific enough, Trump's stooges are actually attempting to sell this tax bill as a stimulus package. It's right there in the title: Tax Cuts & Jobs Act. Citizens of a certain age will recognize it as the Reagan Administration's trickle-down theory of economics.

You will be excused for proffering tart and unappreciative comments such as “Hey! It didn't work then, so maybe it won't work now, either!” 

As a twentieth-century wit once noted “Republicans are people who believe nothing should be done for the first time.”

Donald? Mitch? Paul? I'm pretty stupid. But I'm not vote Republican stupid.

Granted, your tax overhaul gives middle Americans a break in the same sense that—technically—I'm employed. But I shouldn't ever confuse 'employed' with 'self-supporting'.

Non-partisan summations universally conclude that middle-America's cut is not only faint, it's also temporary. By contrast, the parasite class receives cuts that are deep and full and also—to quote Trump's stooges—permanent.

If our homegrown corporations didn't routinely exhibit the venal and self-serving behavior they dismiss their employees for, I might actually be inclined to believe the money they save will fund infrastructure investment and job growth.

But we all know where it's going, don't we?

And we haven't event touched on the ugliness of how these cuts are going to be paid for.

To compensate for lost revenue, Republicans will be forced to reduce costs. They will also want to avoid being seen as growing the deficit, which this bill does—in spades. And I'm guessing oil company subsidies aren't on the table.

More likely, frivolities like Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security will be.

The many will fund the few.

The most contentious, immature, hostile and sociopathic president in American history will oversee the most draconian tax reform in memory.

But like the suspense thriller with multiple red-herring endings, this show ain't over. Not yet.

There is one final indignity.

We must listen to the fortunate son, the spoiled, petulant, ungrateful recipient of an undue amount of life's blessings inform us that he is screwing himself because, as our president, he has discovered a higher calling.

Even higher than grabbing women by their pus... well, never mind.

Yes, his accountants are “going crazy” as Donald inexplicably directs his chauffeur to the poor house because the Republicant tax reform is going to break him.

(Do the room temperature IQs who voted for this cretin really believe this shit?)

I know of a waitress who posts regularly on Facebook. After Trump's election, she ardently, stridently and obnoxiously announced that “America got its balls back.”

Pity those selfsame balls will soon be slapping her on the chin.

More Spin Than a Legion of Vinyl-era DJs

I enjoy jabbing my finger into the carefully-coiffed and studied figure of big business. In a perfect world, I'd be the tiny stone in their shoe they could never find.

It was with this in mind that I wrote Dannon Yogurt after discovering they had shrunk their cartons of Light & Fit yogurt by seven tenths of an ounce while maintaining the price of the previous configuration.

You should know that Dannon isn't the only manufacturer attempting this sleight of hand. Not by a long shot. 

Snack foods, toothpaste, toilet paper, soup—you name it. If the lead bean-counter thinks shaving an ounce or two from the serving or a couple of dozen sheets from the roll is likely to go unnoticed by most consumers, it is as good as done.

It's a beneath the radar price-hike, which is why I delight in telling these folks "I see you!"

I half expected a response informing me of a yogurt shortage, or that the Chinese had developed a sudden craving for the stuff. 

I should be grateful Dannon didn't shrink the serving and raise the price, which incidentally, is the reason for 'New and Improved'. (Displaying their shrewd marketing prowess, you'll notice manufacturers make no attempt to say for whom products are new and improved.)

Without further delay, here is my missive:

Dear Dannon,

I was very excited to see that your new tubs of Light & Fit yogurt have been reduced by .7 of an ounce.

You see, I am recovering from hernia surgery, and the new, lighter packs are so much easier to remove from the refrigerator. It's an older model—you know, the kind with the freezer on top? And when I'd stoop to drag the old tubs out, it put a big strain on my abdomen. So I am very grateful!

Plus, my doctor is also after me to drop a few pounds, so these smaller servings will definitely help me accomplish that. Of course, lifting the older, heavier tubs burned more calories. So I guess we should call it a draw.

I also noticed there was no change in the price. Considering that I'm getting less yogurt, doesn't this amount to a price hike? Trust me, doc is doing a great job of lightening my wallet. He doesn't need the help of a multi-national conglomerate!

I think that in between all this marketing and strategizing you guys are working too hard. Take it from me, that is how I got my hernia in the first place! Instead of lightening my servings and my wallet, you should do one or the other. It's just too damn hot.You know?

Sincerely,

La Piazza Gancio

Their response:

August 16, 2016

Dear La Piazza Gancio,

Thank you for taking the time to contact The Dannon Company. Comments from consumers are very important to us and we certainly appreciate yours.

At Dannon, we take great care to ensure that the highest standards are met in everything we do. In our products, packaging, marketing and advertising, we strive for excellence. When a valued consumer like you takes the time to contact us, we take it seriously. Please be assured your comments will be shared with the appropriate individuals. I know they will find your remarks interesting, and will consider them carefully as we work toward continuous improvement in all areas.

As always, we appreciate your interest in our products and are always available to answer any questions or concerns that you have. If you have any additional questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to call our toll-free number 1-877-DANNON-US (1-877-326-6668), Monday through Friday, 9 A.M. to 6 P.M. Eastern Time.

 
Sincerely,

(name removed)
Consumer Response Representative

Again, like so many of their peers, Dannon completely ignored my question. You have to love how corporations like these reduce consumer inquiries to an occasion for PR. 

Way to stay classy, guys!

I'm trying to imagine the fun I could have at such a place. For instance, when a superior asked me a question I could respond with a verbal resume, informing them only of my latest and greatest accomplishments.

One needs to applaud the (ahem) vigorous work ethic. The unswerving commitment to R&D.

I can hear the executive board now:

“Gentlemen. What's the best way to fatten the profit margin? Do we develop an irresistible new product?”

“No!”

“Work up a compelling new marketing campaign?”

“No!”

“Explore new markets?”

“No!”

"Shrink the serving?"

"Yes!"

I am left to wonder if they expect as little from their employees.

Role Models

I feel awful for Walgreen's executive James Skinner.

I mean, imagine being a high-ranking corporate executive with a seven or eight-figure income and getting caught trying to defraud the country which has been so very, very good to you and your employer.

Pretty embarrassing, no?

Not if you're a member of the business class.

You see, the business class enjoys unmitigated wealth, unbounded prosperity, unceasing riches and absolute impunity because we (with the considerable help of our elected representation) have ceded control of the country to it in exchange for campaign financing.

America has become the employee who asks “How high?” after the boss has requested that we jump.

The business class are our gods.

So you can imagine the vein-popping rage Mr. Skinner must've felt when he and his employer were called out by the President of the United States of America. You can imagine the ignominy of being a wealthy white man who is called a thief by a black one.

It's a wonder apoplexy didn't send our poor Mr. Skinner to the emergency room.

In response, Mr. Skinner addressed a meeting of shareholders and blamed the president for calling attention to Walgreen's attempts to fuck the country out of its rightful tax on Walgreen's earnings, saying that Barack Obama had used Walgreen's as “whipping boys” merely to further a presidential agenda.

The shame-resistant Mr. Skinner went on to add that Walgreen's didn't actually intend to send its corporate headquarters abroad to dodge U.S. taxes, but at the same time never explained why it had devoted so much time and so many resources researching the move.

Getting theoretical for a moment, how do you suppose Mr. Skinner would've reacted to an employee embezzling from Walgreen's? I'm guessing Mr. Skinner would fire the employee even faster than he had his inflated sense of entitlement bruised, which is certainly interesting.

Stealing for Walgreen's is okay. Stealing from Walgreen's is not. (Sorry—just making sure I understand corporate morality.)

So in conclusion, we are to pity not only Mr. Skinner, but Walgreen's, for President Obama's outrageous and unjustified attack on one of America's leading corporations.

I am sure I speak for Mr. Skinner when I say that only an atheist like President Obama could so completely ignore commandment number-one (Thou shalt have no other gods before me) and place America before James Skinner and Walgreen's.

Heresy, isn't it? 

You're Just Minutes Away from Being Business-Friendly!

Inspired by the famous J.F. Kennedy quote (“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country”) and Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner's new favorite thing, I have spent considerable time wondering how you and I can become more business-friendly.

A bit of disposable income would seem to be the obvious answer, but then our employer's CEO would starve to death.

So that's out.

Undeterred, I have endeavored mightily to create four paths employees can take to ensure their employer remains healthy and wealthy, while simultaneously keeping the executive suite corpse-free.

1. Lease your office space. This would be a revenue torrent if every working American agreed to rent their desk, chair, cubicle, workstation and office equipment from their employer.

Imagine our corporations and chief executive officers, gloriously lifted into the trillion-dollarsphere! 

Huzzah!

This is just a missed opportunity. Bleeping golden as a former Illinois governor would have said.

2. Pay to work. Traditionally, Americans have expected to be paid for their labor. This needs to stop. Have you ever considered what your employer's bottom line would look like if you paid for your employment?

Would there even be enough zeros in the mathematical spectrum to measure the annual windfall?

Again, this is a missed opportunity that demands a feasibility study. Or an urgent inter-office memo.

Either one works.

3. Volunteer. You've always suspected you were a non-profit organization. Here's your chance to make that a reality.

Like the previous suggestions, this might provoke concerns about your survival, but that's just being selfish. We're talking the greatest good for the greatest number here. Kind of.

Give till it hurts.

4. Slave labor. The problem with volunteers is they can leave. Slaves can't. And enabled by a stable workforce, business can plan and project. The better to build an indomitable empire upon the backs of a resource they know will be available—regardless of economic conditions.

Nothing says 'continuity' like shackles and leg irons.

The Vampires in Brooks Brothers Suits

In December of 2011, I posted a piece called Giving It Away. It was about corporate welfare in Illinois. In the seven-hundred days since, nothing has changed.

The state’s finances remain in ruins, critical legislation has not been passed, and the blood-sucking ghouls who inhabit our executive suites continue to approach the state for hand-outs.

With Christmas just under a month away, I thought it would be appropriate to post about the Illinois state legislature’s ongoing efforts at playing Santa:

In 2010, the Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling. Part of the fallout from the infamous Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission decision was that corporations possessed the same rights as individuals insofar as political advocacy is concerned.

And three years later, I agree. Corporations are people. So let’s start treating them as such.

In year-six of the Great Recession, U.S. corporations continue to approach state governments for hand-outs. An executive has only to play a few rounds of golf with officials from another state or municipality before legislators are scurrying to round-up a fresh batch of write-offs, deferments, loopholes and (nudge-nudge) “incentives”.

Yet conservatives continue to sputter and rage over the alleged over-taxation and over-regulation of these same corporations. The fact that corporate tax rates are a mere shadow of their nineteen-fifties selves, or that the corporate tax code is riddled with loopholes is irrelevant.

Where were they when Apple CEO Tim Cook testified that Apple’s tax rate on recent income of seventy-four billion dollars was two-percent? Exactly how is it that a corporation maintaining a post office box in some exotic tax haven (thereby exempting it from U.S. taxes) qualifies it as over-regulated?

Much less over-taxed?

While our elected representation pays requisite lip service to the vanishing middle-class and the mounting struggles of the working man every campaign cycle, they reliably enable corporations to duck tens of millions of dollars in taxes.

Illinois-based Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) provides a textbook example.

The food-processing and commodities-trading monolith is a glowing corporate success. They ranked twenty-seventh on the 2013 edition of Fortune magazine’s Fortune 500 list, with revenue of eighty-nine billion dollars.

Less-impressive is the fact they could teach Vito Corleone a thing or two about extortion.

ADM approached the state of Illinois—even as it lay emaciated and shrunken on its deathbed—and coyly curling a strand of hair around its fingers, intimated it might want to move. But they’re not sure where. It could be Dallas or St. Louis or even Chicago.

There are just so many places!

The Illinois General Assembly obediently responded. Its latest offer, while a reduction from the forty-million dollars ADM originally sought, is a big, fat giveaway to a company making a mountain of money even a professional athlete couldn’t imagine.

ADM feels it should be compensated for remaining in the intolerable backwater of Decatur, Illinois. Ask yourself: where are the well-heeled executive wives even supposed to shop?

From my vantage point, Archer Daniels Midland appears to be doing just fine. It’s a little tough to see that they need to be paid for anything apart from the services they render their customers. Their employees are doing a bang-up job, and I think ADM’s towering revenue is reward-enough for their judicious hiring.

(But if ADM truly feels unappreciated, I’d be happy to drop in and give their execs a hearty pat on the back.)

With a mountain of unpaid bills, an unfunded pension crisis that is the worst in the nation and bond ratings that are falling like interest in the Jonas Brothers, doesn’t Illinois have enough drama without yielding to the demands of a blood-sucking corporate parasite?

Exactly what should four-thousand jobs (the number of ADM employees in Decatur) cost—if anything? Furthermore, why pay ADM for hiring people who are already making vast amounts of money for them? Is there any conclusive proof that paying companies to stay outweighs the giveaways and tax forfeitures?

Furthermore, this legislation allows ADM to keep their employee’s income tax withholding, reason being that since there are years in which they have no tax obligation to the state, they are unable to take advantage of certain incentives.

Which is like asking Macy’s to compensate you because you weren’t able to use all their coupons.

Ostensibly, the bill will require ADM to create jobs, as well as maintain its current staffing levels. But despite living in the age of (ahem) over-regulated businesses, I have yet to see a government tell a corporation it couldn’t lay-off its employees. Or insist that it hire.

And neither have you.

When asked if he could guarantee that ADM would remain in Illinois after catching a glimpse of its early Christmas present, Greg Webb, their vice-president of government relations, could only issue a tepid “I don’t know about the guarantee part.”

Fuck you too, Greg.

This sucks for everyone—except Archer Daniels Midland. Taxpayers should never, ever be a corporate revenue stream.

Congress slashed unemployment benefits in August. Now we have the six-percent cut in food stamp (SNAP) benefits. Middle-class wages are flat. Benefits are disappearing—along with full-time jobs.

Tens of millions of people remain un—or under—employed as a result of the corporate-induced Great Recession, which I think we can all agree is just great.

Our Supreme Court declared that corporations are people, too. What I want to know is when do we start treating them like one?

The Grand Illusion

At this stage of the game, I’ve come to understand that retail is theater. It’s a dramatic production, complete with set, director, cast, crew and backstage theatrics.

It has a script. A set of words that, in addition to bringing uniformity to employee-customer exchanges, will hopefully distinguish this production from the others currently being staged.

But even as one production works to separate itself from another, they invariably end up being indistinguishable. They unfailingly adopt identical twists and wrinkles, like teen-agers embracing the same fad even as they seek to establish their individuality.

Case in point is the reluctance of business to write or speak any word or phrase which imparts the faintest inference of ‘no’.

I recently wrote a letter to a frozen pizza manufacturer, bemoaning the sudden disappearance of my favorite variety. Instead of receiving a simple confirmation, I received several paragraphs of public relations froth extolling the virtues of its replacement.

At no point was my query addressed, presumably because it meant acknowledging that my life was now bereft of my favorite frozen pizza, and they were to blame.

Despite my deep and abiding love of this pizza, I can promise with absolute certainty that life would have continued even had this company possessed the clarity and intestinal fortitude to address my question with a simple “We’re sorry. The pizza you inquired about didn’t meet sales projections, and as a result has been replaced by another variety. Thank you for your interest in Home Run Inn pizza.”

Then there was the live, in-person example I received at my place of underemployment.

A man had been waiting at our contractor’s desk. Manning the register nearest this desk, I approached and asked if I could help. After hearing the reason for his visit, I informed him the desk was closed weekends and was on the verge of directing him to the people who could help when our new store manager swooped in.

After informing me in tones an aggrieved teacher would use with an errant pupil that the desk is “never” closed, she escorted the customer to the department I was directing him to in the first place.

I stood and pondered our contractor’s desk. Despite it lacking any of the five employees who normally populated it and the attendant bustle of activity, I had obviously erred in assuming it was closed.

What was I thinking?

Exactly how does this deception benefit our customer? Then I realized the irreparable damage his psyche would have suffered as a result of hearing our contractor’s desk was, indeed, closed weekends.

So there’s that.

And then there’s the irreversible damage my employer could have suffered had this customer gone online and vented. It’s too horrible to even consider.

Write this down—customers must never hear the word ‘no’. It doesn’t exist. No never happens.

So yes, retail is theater. A carefully-packaged drama where reality is whatever the playwright says it is.

In addition to his more-obvious gifts, who knew Shakespeare’s declaration “All the world’s a stage” would presage twenty-first century business models?

You must excuse me now. I have a matinee at two.

Obnoxiousness: Defined

Six weeks ago, I wrote of the staggering ignorance and contempt Goldman-Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein holds for people who receive any monies/services/and or benefits he does not. Even when we pay for them.

Our failure to understand the consequences of our unbridled gluttony and its effect upon his starving Wall Street brethren has earned us his well-chronicled derision.

Now, former AIG CEO Maurice Greenberg (who asks that we call him “Hank”) seeks to outdo his Wall Street compadre by joining a lawsuit filed against the American government seeking redress for the “excessive” interest the government charged AIG for its 2008 bailout of the financial giant.

Yes—you read that correctly. No one snuck up behind you and bashed your skull in with a blunt instrument. Nor are you experiencing a cardiac episode.

Folksy, regular guy Hank wants to sue America “on behalf of” AIG stockholders who were made to shoulder the expense of the government’s (presumably excessive) rescue of the corporate parasite.

If this strikes you as suing the ambulance company because you made it to the hospital in time for life-saving surgery, you’re standing smack dab in the middle of the road to reason.

Let’s go over this one more time, so that even if you’re a cash-addled, Wall Street shithead you understand the lunacy of it:

Because AIG stockholders continue to earn money from their AIG shares (which, by the way, climbed 50% in value last year) thanks to the American taxpayer, Greenberg and AIG want to sue same because it cost them money to be brought back from the dead so that they might be allowed to live and continue making money.

For a change, the nation and its citizenry reacted with swift, bracing clarity.  The resounding sentiment was something along the lines of “Bite me, AIG! Fuck off, Greenberg!” Even officialdom weighed-in with uncharacteristically blunt remarks.

But if I have learned anything watching America disintegrate into a corpocracy, it is that the corporate sense of entitlement is like a virus. It will emerge and retreat until it has chanced upon the ideal set of circumstances and the perfect host which will allow it to thrive.

Failing a Republican president and/or a Republican-dominated Congress, it will wait until things quiet down and then find a back door and pending legislation to quietly attach itself to.

You just watch.

Doing God's Work

What is an asshole?

Medically speaking, it’s a colloquial term for the anus, which plays a critical role in maintaining our body’s health by providing an outlet for the waste material which would otherwise poison us.

But there is another meaning to the word. One which identifies a person of unusual cruelty or someone who is mean-spirited.

To wit, Lloyd Blankfein is a Wall Street banker and head of the most feral economic entity in the United States—Goldman Sachs. He has knowingly and willingly participated in the economic rape of the very country which went to war to stop the genocide being carried out on his fellow Jews in World War II.

How’s that for gratitude?

Furthermore, the title of this post is a quote of Blankfein's. It is how he describes his work on Wall Street. If you need further proof as to the depth of Wall Street’s arrogance or their jaw-dropping contempt for anyone not in their tax bracket, read Blankfein’s thoughts on entitlements, taken from a recent appearance on 60 Minutes:


BLANKFEIN: You’re going to have to undoubtedly do something to lower people’s expectations — the entitlements and what people think that they’re going to get, because it’s not going to — they’re not going to get it.

PELLEY: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid?

BLANKFEIN: You can look at history of these things, and Social Security wasn’t devised to be a system that supported you for a 30-year retirement after a 25-year career. … So there will be things that, you know, the retirement age has to be changed, maybe some of the benefits have to be affected, maybe some of the inflation adjustments have to be revised. But in general, entitlements have to be slowed down and contained.

PELLEY: Because we can’t afford them going forward?

BLANKFEIN: Because we can’t afford them.


What is so curious about Blankfein’s reasoning is that we can apparently afford the lavish corporate entitlements the United States of America routinely offers its largest and wealthiest companies. Ditto the extravagant tax reductions and loopholes we have gifted our economic elite with.

We’ve all heard how General Electric paid no income taxes on income of fourteen-billion dollars, and how Warren Buffet’s secretary had a higher percentage of her income subjected to income tax than did her boss, the renowned investor.

Yet we’re the parasites receiving the free ride which is bankrupting the country.

Let me tell you something Mr. Blankfein. Social Security isn't free. People like me get up at 6 AM, endure vein-popping congestion, heinous co-workers and venal bosses to contribute to it. In other words, we work for it.

You’re not paying for it, Mr. Blankfein. And neither are your Wall Street pals. Your great-great-great grandchildren won’t have to do without new BMWs because I receive Social Security.

Are we clear?

It’s funny how people like Lloyd Blankfein view entitlements; they are any and all monies and/or services they don't receive a majority of.

I wonder what Blankfein considers the handing over of four-billion dollars annually to Exxon and other oil companies merely to look for oil. Or the awarding of tax breaks to businesses which export jobs. And the official wink given tax-dodging, off-shore corporate headquarters.

Examples of a socialist president punishing success? Or big, fat, fucking entitlements?

It is nothing less than ironic that while one kind of asshole removes waste and potential poisons, another creates them. Methinks society would be better served by grinding the likes of Lloyd Blankfein into pig feed.

Call it a case of garbage in, garbage out.

More shaving. More screwing.

When I was young, I worked in a tough, uncensored warehouse. PC had only recently begun to stand for personal computer. Politically correct wasn't even on the radar.

So after depositing a skid of merchandise in the wrong shipping lane, an irritated foreman asked me: “I know you’re a dumb-ass. I get it. Why do you keep proving it to me?”

I want to ask the same question of my employers. But an inconvenient need for food and shelter renders this behavior risky. So I administer yet another self-inflicted bite to my poor, pockmarked tongue.

And my employers continue to see the circular firing squad as the best path forward.

Case in point is a part-time position I landed in spring at one of those big box home improvement stores. You know, the ones with everything from rebar and cement mix to sub-zero refrigerators and orchids. I’m sure there’s one in your neighborhood.

My training consisted of three eight-hour days spent watching videos—in solitaire. Videos about customer service and store procedures and how to operate equipment. Videos about workplace safety and sexual harassment and company policy. And then there were the videos on customer service.

Did I mention the ones on customer service?

I should add that the “hands on” portion of the training was eliminated because of insufficient staffing.

The hard part came when I was to convert the content of the videos into living, breathing, three-dimensional reality. But I spent my first three days in the self check-out area. I'm not sure what I was supposed to learn by watching people check-out, but I'm sure there was something.

Then an entire week passed before I was scheduled to work again. If this makes sense on another plane, it’s a flight I don’t have a ticket for.

A few weeks in, I discovered that the self-proclaimed industry leader who preached customer service non-stop got all obsessive-compulsive when it came to shaving payroll to a bare minimum that would make a stripper blush.

That insufficient staffing I encountered during training? It wasn’t an aberration—it was business as usual. Standard operating procedure.

As a consequence, customers can’t find salespeople. Employees attempting to contact other departments get busy signals when the phone doesn’t ring endlessly. And theft is rampant because aisle after aisle is bereft of even a token human presence.

You don't need the radio telescope in Arecibo to discover what kind of customer service this is. But no worries—Wall Street really loves our rate of return.

However much I enjoy having a customer stare a hole into me because I can’t get another department on the phone, or because the hardware section is completely uncontaminated by hardware clerks, it gets old. Really old.

And it’s not just the wee folk who suffer.

Department managers manage sour and dispirited staffs made up of underemployed part-timers because Wall Street says full-timers get benefits, and benefits are profit-killers.

So instead of juggling eight schedules, they juggle twenty. Instead of informing eight staffers of a new procedure, they (theoretically) inform twenty. And instead of tracking eight people's performance, they track twenty's. It must be wearying.

Then there are the monthly updates, which are little more than a mechanism for disseminating company propaganda.

Last month, the update focused on theft. I mean shrinkage. It offered fascinating statistics on theft, er, shrinkage, and what employees can do to combat it. And like the information contained in the training videos, it made perfect sense.

The problem is that the folks in training never got the memo from finance about payroll, so the gulf that exists between what this company wants to do and what it actually does remains unsullied by anything resembling a bridge.

I mean, I’d love to root between the two-dozen bags of cement mix/potting soil/road salt and grass seed customers routinely buy for circular saw blades, power tools and silver solder—just as soon as the 'wait to checkout' metric is eliminated. Ditto the one for 'cashier friendliness'.

Apparently, this needs to be said: you can’t have rapid check-outs and thorough inspections for hidden-on-purpose merchandise. They’re incompatible. Mutually-exclusive. A wordy oxymoron.

And while I’m at it, you also can’t staff a hundred-thousand square foot store with a dozen people and not expect thieves to have a free-for-all.

Let me know when you figure out what your priorities are. K?

My employer has demonstrated—repeatedly—they’re not about the customer service. They’re about extracting the greatest amount of cash from the store in the shortest amount of time with the fewest possible expenses.

It’s rape as a business plan.

The secret shoppers and the metrics and the marketing can't obscure that hoary old expression about actions speaking louder than words.

But as long as those guys with mansions in the Hamptons and fleets of Ferraris say it’s all good, it is.

Who am I to argue with success?

Giving It Away

Silly me. I thought my employer paid me because I enhanced their profitability. By providing a skill, I enabled them to bring a product or service to market better or faster or more-efficiently.

Now I find that business is actually performing a public service by employing me. Who knew employment was a charitable act, done to protect America's labor force from the horrors of daytime TV?

What else to think after seeing so many of Illinois’ corporate citizens approach our bankrupt state government and request tax relief and deferments and subsidies? To hear them tell it, the employment they offer is a radiant act of selflessness equal to anything Mother Teresa ever did in India.

Employees aren’t the drop of oil or bit of grease that expedites the profit-making machinery. No. Employees are the ungrateful beneficiaries of really nice guys just trying to do the right thing.

According to our newly emboldened business class, they should be subsidized because they employ people. And pay them. And because they pay people, they themselves should be paid—even though they already are.

Confused? Me, too. But not to worry. This makes perfect sense in executive suites and in the GOP national headquarters.

If gigantic multi-national corporations aren’t our biggest parasites, who is? Is there anyone who finds something even a little objectionable about billion-dollar corporations extorting bankrupt state governments for whatever spare change might be lying around?

Do the words entitlement or leech spring to mind? Rape? How about necrophilia?

They should.

Struggling telecommunications giant Motorola got $100 million from the state of Illinois for not leaving. Struggling retail giant Sears yesterday received $150 million in tax credits and will receive another $125 million in property tax relief for, again, not leaving.

The CME Group, which owns the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Board of Trade has also received welfare, the exact nature of which is unknown. CME also threatened to leave.

Sniff.

And those are just the most-recent cases. My manners would be showing if I neglected to mention Navistar, Chrysler, Continental Tire and U.S. Cellular.

As consumers, our options are limited. The governor is also in a spot. Call the guilty parties out in public and you risk ruffling their feathers and having these Vito Corleone wanna-bes make good on their threats.

Pay the scumbags and you outrage the public, especially when cuts to public transit, health care and education are deep and widespread. And don't forget, the public still votes.

The best response is a public boycott. Let consumer-dependent companies like Motorola and Sears know how the tax-paying public feels about extortion. Especially for entities that have received the bounty of government largesse these corporations have.

While we’re sensitive to the fact it costs a lot of money to make a lot of money, it’s not all gravy, all the time. In other words, the one-hundred percent profit margin will remain a fantasy—at least until the next Republican president signs the slave labor mandate.

Besides, whatever happened to the small government ideal, anyway? Oh that’s right—that’s unless it can shovel a mountain of public cash into your sweaty, clutching hands. Got it.

It’s Christmas, folks. Companies like Motorola and Sears are never more vulnerable than now. We should strenuously and obstreperously not be okay with this.

Ever.

The Many Roads to 'No'

No one will ever confuse me with Leif Erickson or Juan Pizzaro. Not Vasco da Gama, Hernan Cortes or Christopher Columbus. And yet I too have discovered something. A place only rumored to exist. I have discovered hell.

How else to feel with days that begin like this?


La Piazza Gancio,


Thank you for your interest in ____'s Department Stores. We appreciate the time you took to consider us for employment at our store locations.

We have given your background and qualifications careful consideration in relation to the opportunity for which you've expressed interest and have determined that we are unable to match your qualifications to a position at this time. We would encourage you to continue to check snagajob.com for future opportunities.

Thank you again for your interest in ____'s and please accept our best wishes for success in your future career endeavors.


Best Regards,

Human Resources


At least it didn’t open with ‘Dear’.

It is unclear exactly what aspect of my background renders me ineligible for even seasonal, part-time employment. Yet knowing the Van Halen-like heights (remember no brown M&Ms?) corporate fickleness has reached, I am likely better off in the darkness of my ignorance.

But as an occasionally-sentient human being, questions persist.

I smile. I make eye contact. I speak in concise, direct sentences that answer the interviewer’s questions. I am nicely dressed. I am enthusiastic. I sit up straight, don’t fidget and even made everyone at a recent group interview belly laugh—twice. I am sober.

You read this blog—do I not ooze personality? Does charisma not spill from me like filling from a buttery, cinnamon-laced apple pie?

What’s not to like? Isn’t my pixie dust sparkly-enough?

How can prospective employers fail to see how I could lighten a customer’s mood, especially when said customer discovers half the items they’re shopping for are either out of stock, the wrong size, style or color? At 11:30 PM on a weeknight with just three shopping days left until Christmas?

I would be a two-legged Mai Tai. A warm mug of spiced cider. A pungent glass of Pinot Noir. No tipping required.

Perhaps I've been branded a flight risk. Since the majority of my employment has (thankfully) been for wages higher than what seasonal positions offer, this means I will vacate the position at first opportunity—as if there were any.

Then there is my college degree, which conveniently confirms to any would-be employer that I will be bored. This somehow differentiates me from the sullen, texting palm zombies already hired.

Bail is set at extended unemployment

Could it be that I fail to sufficiently impress the young women I am invariably interviewed by?

When asked why I want to work at the ________ store, perhaps I don’t become starry-eyed enough as I relate how working from midnight to eight AM the day after Thanksgiving for what can’t even be described as a living wage has been a dream of mine since I was a little boy.

Which presents yet-another another problem: I have a penis.

This provokes in me the unsettling feeling that to these women, drunk on some vague notion of girl-power, regard me as their enemy. Middle-aged white guys stand in the way of everything they want to be, and always have. Isn't this their chance for payback?

Just for a change, I’d like to receive a wan smile, a limp handshake and the complete avoidance of eye contact from a middle-aged white guy after an interview.

But the hideousness doesn’t end there.

That would be when friends, acquaintances and overheard conversations confirm that many of those deemed fit for seasonal slavery don’t even show up for their first day on the job, nor possess the integrity to even call employer number-one and inform them that they have accepted employment with employer number-two.

Were circumstances not so bleak, I would laugh and spit that these corporate shitheads get exactly what they deserve.

But money is oxygen, and I am suffocating.

My Pet Peeves

Like most people, I have pet peeves. Unlike most people, I keep mine in a zoo. A petting zoo, to be exact. The kind where rabies shots are highly-encouraged prior to admission.

My pet peeves range from justifiable homicide (well, almost) to the merely annoying. That said, allow me to present the seventy-five fascinating and multitudinous things that piss me off:

1. Right-wing conservatives
2. Big Business
3. The impunity of Wall Street
4. Corporate welfare
5. The NRA
6. Executive compensation
7. Stoplights
8. Insurance companies
9. Looking for work
10. Our refusal to address the cause of skyrocketing health care costs—only the symptoms.
11. Credit card companies
12. Oil companies
13. Hyperbole
14. Cable TV providers
15. Corporate banks
16. Pharmaceutical manufacturers
17. The clean coal lobby
18. Saggy jeans
19. Pick-up trucks/sport utility vehicles
20. Congress
21. The Los Angeles Lakers
22. Pro-lifers
23. Bird shit on my car
24. Control freaks
25. Defense contractors
26. Terrorism
27. Impatience
28. Parents who, evidence to the contrary, think their children are incapable of failure and bad behavior (up to and including premeditated murder) merely because said children sprang from their loins.
29. Habitat destruction
30. Bullies
31. Selfishness
32. One-issue voters
33. The New York Yankees
34. Cheapskates
35. The popularly accepted re-imagining of Ronald Reagan as great president and visionary.
36. Reality TV
37. Violent computer games
38. People who use their cell phones a.) while driving b.) while shopping c.) while going to the bathroom d.) in movie theaters e.) in restaurants.
39. This persistent idea that fowl is food.
40. People who say they’d continue working even after winning the lottery.
41. Barry Bonds
42. Liars
43. Climate change deniers
44. Psychology-as-fashion (namely, positive thinking)
45. The owners of professional sports franchises who hold cities hostage for publicly-funded stadiums for what are privately-owned businesses, and the municipal governments who let them.
46. Being labeled a racist because I oppose illegal immigration.
47. Fake boobs
48. Golf
49. Weak drinks
50. People who belch in public
51. The price of concert tickets
52. Drama queens
53. Professional wrestling
54. Arrogance
55. Budweiser
56. The weather in the Midwest
57. The San Francisco 49ers
58. Carrie Prejean
59. Gangster hip-hop
60. Women who complain about guys in Speedos
61. Early-release programs
62. Being interrupted
63. Sour cream on Mexican food
64. Reggaeton
65. Monster truck shows
66. The New York Mets
67. Sale items that don’t ring up at the advertised price.
68. Jerry Jones
69. People who insist on dragging two-foot wide shopping carts down three-foot wide aisles.
70. Competitive eating contests
71. Fart jokes
72. The words devastated, extreme, legacy and iconic.
73. Music videos
74. The names real estate developers give their developments.
75. Smooth jazz

I Have a (Pipe) Dream

Welcome. I’m La Piazza Gancio, and tonight on Interview we're pleased to have as our guest Dick Peanus.

Dick is the Chairman and CEO of the Deities, a corporate amalgamation of banks, investment houses, oil companies, credit card companies, pharmaceutical manufacturers and healthcare providers.

Me: Hello and thank you for coming.

Dick smiles smugly and nods.

Me: I’d like to talk about business. Particularly in the midst of what appears to be the greatest financial catastrophe since the Great Depression. How are the Deities coping?

Dick: Through savvy management and the careful allocation of resources, the Deities have successfully weathered the storm and posted a seventy-billion dollar profit last quarter.

Me: Seventy-billion dollars! And that’s profit—not sales?

Dick: Yes.

Me: Isn’t that a bit more than just weathering the storm?

Dick: Well, in order to maintain market share, profitability and to serve our shareholders, changes had to be made. It didn’t just happen.

Me: What kind of changes?

Dick: It was necessary to divest ourselves of many of our human assets. These divestitures were a very painful and difficult decision.

Me: You mean you fired people.

Dick: Yes. It was either that or shut the doors. We have a responsibility to our shareholders, and we take that responsibility very seriously.

Me: I find it hard to believe that with extensive holdings in pharmaceuticals, oil, healthcare and on Wall Street that the Deities are or were in trouble.

Dick: You’d be surprised. Our operations and development costs are enormous, and they’re not going down any time soon. A good example is the cost of attracting the top drawer financial talent we need to develop new sources of revenue and keep them ahead of the curve.

Me: So the profits you make not only on Wall Street, but in pharmaceuticals, healthcare and oil barely cover expenses? Is that what you’re telling me?

Dick: You forget that we have shareholders. This isn’t just about us. There’s a bigger picture out there.

Me: How many shareholders are there?

Dick: Millions.

Me: I see. And how many shares do you own in the Deities?

Dick: I couldn’t tell you.

Me: I can. Six million. And when combined with the ten members of your executive board, the total goes to twenty-six million, or nearly three-quarters of the outstanding shares. So when you say ‘shareholders’, isn't that just code for you and the board?

Dick: I assure you, there are millions of shareholders. Secondly, every CEO and board member has stock options. It is commonplace for people in those positions to receive company stock as part of their compensation packages. There's nothing unusual about that.

Me: So let me get a handle on this. In addition to your traditional salaries, you also receive bonuses—which are unrelated to company performance. And then stock on top of that. Is that correct?

Dick nods yes.

Me: As the majority stockholder, isn't it conceivable that you stand to benefit personally from actions which don’t necessarily benefit the company as a whole?

Dick: Your point being?

Me: For instance, when company performance suffers because of wholesale layoffs, Wall Street blindly applauds the cost-cutting and the value of your stock goes up. You and the board consequently get to stuff your pockets with cash.

Dick: Look. We’re not a social welfare agency. It’s not our job to make sure that every American has a job.

Me: What exactly is your job?

Dick: To plot the course of the future. To turn a profit. To maintain and increase shareholder value.

Me: 'Shareholder' being, for all intent and purposes, you and the ten board members.

Dick: No comment.

Me: It leaves me speechless as well, Dick. Let’s turn to a different topic. How much in tax breaks, tax loopholes and corporate subsidies does the Deities receive annually?

Dick: I’m sure I don’t know.

Me: And what did the Deities contribute to political campaigns during the last election cycle? What did you spend on lobbyists?

Dick: I’m a CEO—not some accountant who tracks petty cash.

Me: Is that what you call one hundred and ninety-seven million dollars? Petty cash?

Dick shrugs his shoulders non-chalantly.

Me: But yet you needed to lay-off 13,000 employees because your revenue streams were drying up.

Dick: We’ve done nothing illegal.

Me: Only because you’ve purchased the law-makers and dictated the law.

Dick: As I said a minute ago, we’ve done nothing illegal. Every course of action taken by the Deities is completely within the law and upholds our responsibility to our stakeholders.

Me: Okay. Tell us about your 4 America campaign.

Dick: (brightening) In the Deities’ ongoing effort to promote good health, we are offering an American flag to anyone who participates in a health care plan administered by the Deities, or obtains a prescription for a pharmaceutical manufactured by one of our subsidiaries. However, pre-existing conditions may affect availability.

Me: (laughs) Yet at the same time, you’re throwing tens of thousands of people onto public relief rolls and taking away their health care coverage while you collect hundreds of millions of dollars in corporate subsidies and dodge millions more in taxes by claiming that the Deities are headquartered in a one-bedroom apartment on the Isle of Man. Curious form of patriotism, don’t you think?

Dick: (angrily) Who underwrote the Matisse exhibit at the Guggenheim? And the Eugene O’Neill playhouse on public TV? Who brought the Ballet Company of Sierra Leone to Lincoln Center? Who organized fund-raising for the two Pandas on loan from China at the National Zoo? We did!

Me: And you received still-another tax break for doing it! And then you turn around and buy fear-mongering politicians who campaign on the threat of an unprecedented transfer of wealth should a Democrat take office and enact budget-busting social programs like food stamps and unemployment insurance. Is that correct?

Dick stares resolutely ahead.

Me: Dick, isn’t it true that there is indeed an unprecedented transfer of wealth occurring in this country, but that it’s flowing upstream, not down? Isn’t it true that while income for the middle class has increased just twenty percent since 1979, income for the wealthiest one or two percent of has increased over one hundred and seventy percent in the same period? Isn’t it true that you and the elected representation you buy are in fact stealing the country as you consign the poor and middle classes to what will eventually be an existence of Industrial Age slavery? Isn’t it true? Isn’t it?

Dick says nothing.

Me: Tell me I have it wrong, Dick. Please.

Dick: (tersely) For the last time, everything we have done is within the framework of the law. We have done nothing illegal.

Me: So your best answer is that you haven't broken any of the laws you had your employees in the DC office write. What a sterling achievement. (Disgustedly) Goodnight, America.

Does This Make You Angry?

This op-ed piece by Bob Herbert of the New York Times appeared in the July 30th edition of that newspaper.

The treatment of workers by American corporations has been worse — far more treacherous — than most of the population realizes. There was no need for so many men and women to be forced out of their jobs in the downturn known as the great recession.

Many of those workers were cashiered for no reason other than outright greed by corporate managers. And that cruel, irresponsible, shortsighted policy has resulted in widespread human suffering and is doing great harm to the economy.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Andrew Sum, an economics professor and director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston. “Not only did they throw all these people off the payrolls, they also cut back on the hours of the people who stayed on the job.”

As Professor Sum studied the data coming in from the recession, he realized that the carnage that occurred in the workplace was out of proportion to the economic hit that corporations were taking. While no one questions the severity of the downturn — the worst of the entire post-World War II period — the economic data show that workers to a great extent were shamefully exploited.

The recession officially started in December 2007. From the fourth quarter of 2007 to the fourth quarter of 2009, real aggregate output in the U.S., as measured by the gross domestic product, fell by about 2.5 percent. But employers cut their payrolls by 6 percent.

In many cases, bosses told panicked workers who were still on the job that they had to take pay cuts or cuts in hours, or both. And raises were out of the question. The staggering job losses and stagnant wages are central reasons why any real recovery has been so difficult.

“They threw out far more workers and hours than they lost output,” said Professor Sum. “Here’s what happened: At the end of the fourth quarter in 2008, you see corporate profits begin to really take off, and they grow by the time you get to the first quarter of 2010 by $572 billion. And over that same time period, wage and salary payments go down by $122 billion.”

That kind of disconnect, said Mr. Sum, had never been seen before in all the decades since World War II.

In short, the corporations are making out like bandits. Now they’re sitting on mountains of cash and they still are not interested in hiring to any significant degree, or strengthening workers’ paychecks.

Productivity tells the story. Increases in the productivity of American workers are supposed to go hand in hand with improvements in their standard of living. That’s how capitalism is supposed to work. That’s how the economic pie expands, and we’re all supposed to have a fair share of that expansion.

Corporations have now said the hell with that. Economists believe the nation may have emerged, technically, from the recession early in the summer of 2009. As Professor Sum writes in a new study for the labor market center, this period of economic recovery “has seen the most lopsided gains in corporate profits relative to real wages and salaries in our history.”

Worker productivity has increased dramatically, but the workers themselves have seen no gains from their increased production. It has all gone to corporate profits. This is unprecedented in the postwar years, and it is wrong.

Having taken everything for themselves, the corporations are so awash in cash they don’t know what to do with it all. Citing a recent article from Bloomberg BusinessWeek, Professor Sum noted that in July cash at the nation’s nonfinancial corporations stood at $1.84 trillion, a 27 percent increase over early 2007. Moody’s has pointed out that as a percent of total company assets, cash has reached a level not seen in the past half-century.

Executives are delighted with this ill-gotten bonanza. Charles D. McLane Jr. is the chief financial officer of Alcoa, which recently experienced a turnaround in profits and a 22 percent increase in revenue. As The Times reported this week, Mr. McLane assured investors that his company was in no hurry to bring back 37,000 workers who were let go since 2008. The plan is to minimize rehires wherever possible, he said, adding, “We’re not only holding head-count levels, but are also driving restructuring this quarter that will result in further reductions.”

There can be no robust recovery as long as corporations are intent on keeping idle workers sidelined and squeezing the pay of those on the job.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Germany and Japan, because of a combination of government and corporate policies, suffered far less worker dislocation in the recession than the U.S. Until we begin to value our workers, and understand the critical importance of employment to a thriving economy, we will continue to see our standards of living decline.

The Right Profile

I’m always grateful for the chance to laugh at corporate America. If reinventing the wheel and fixing what isn’t broken guaranteed success, America’s corporations would be world-beaters.

They would be the indomitable industry leaders their help wanted posts say they are—even without the corporate welfare, government subsidies and abundant tax loopholes.

The latest opportunity for mirth comes from a friend, referred to in earlier posts as Lucky.

Lucky is looking to make a lateral move within the company he has faithfully served for nearly a quarter-century. It is commonly agreed that Lucky is a fine person, and has done a wonderful job in whatever department he has landed.

But the new and improved version of his employer requires that Lucky submit to a personality profile, which guarantees a perfect match for the companies who use them.

This is likely the reason people no longer leave their jobs or are fired, because thanks to the personality profile, every hire is now a perfect hire.

Oh wait, they do. And they are. But now I'm not being a team player. *sniff*

Long story short, Lucky failed his personality inventory.

After determining that he possessed an unacceptable number of undesirable personality traits, the computer e-mailed Lucky at his company e-mail address to inform him that no further action would be taken on his application.

Imagine the employment that could have been prevented had personality profiles been in use when Lucky first applied twenty-five years ago.

Think of the profits, the market-share so cavalierly and ignorantly thrown away. They coulda been a contender. Sigh.

The same corporate America that brought you the Chevrolet Vega and Coke II has decided the personality profile is its latest panacea. Could someone cue Public Enemy's Don't Believe the Hype?

To paraphrase H.L. Mencken, no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of corporate America.

Small Government? Or Bigger Business?

Item number-one on the conservative agenda is to make small government a campaign issue. Republican candidates dutifully include it in their recitations of party talking points, and deluded tea-baggers shout themselves hoarse in their frothing, wild-eyed mania for it.

But who does small government really benefit?

Not surprisingly, small government’s most-ardent admirers are wealthy businessmen. The reasons are simple. Observing government guidelines and conforming to government regulations costs money. And the more a business spends on fulfilling government requirements, the less there is for the guy in the corner office.

There’s also the issue of ego. Business is forever a child attempting to convince mom and dad it doesn’t need a babysitter. That it’s old-enough to stay home alone. Government regulation is the wagging finger that says it isn’t.

The small government ideal proposed by conservatives removes the speed bumps from the marketplace, while it diminishes the quality of life for just about everyone else. It lets business do whatever it wants, whenever it wants, wherever it wants. And make no mistake—conservatives are all about the business. First, last and always. The rest is just marketing.

But there’s a problem. Most of us don’t give a damn how much CEOs make. We’re not terribly concerned about the welfare of the wealthy. How can their problem be made our problem? How can government regulation be marketed as an issue constraining our personal liberty, and not one set to clear the runway for business unbound?

Pull out the time-honored tricks. Exaggeration. Lies. Misinformation. Find the lowest common denominator of your constituent’s anger and exploit, exploit, exploit. Push that hot button until your fingers hurt. You remember last summer’s death panels, don’t you?

While challenged by leading anything more than a parade, conservatives are master manipulators and brilliant marketers. They are experts at misdirection: You’re not pissed-off at British Petroleum’s incompetence and lack of accountability! You’re pissed-off at the Obama administration’s response!

In tea-bag land, Wall Street, Massey Energy and BP aren’t proof of what happens when mom and dad decide to forego the babysitter for an evening. They’re proof of how government meddling muddies the waters of commerce.

Do you see the delusion here? The naked self-interest in corporate America’s backing of this idea? Tell me how this differs from ghetto thugs advising their neighbors-slash-victims “No snitching”.

You can’t because it doesn’t.

Business is a one-celled organism. It has one instinct, and one instinct only. And that is to make as much money as possible. Left unregulated, it is a virus which invariably destroys its host. Left unregulated, business runs amuck with the numbing regularity that children choose Happy Meals over six-course, sit-down dinners.

I have a request to make of the hypnotized. Those of you who stubbornly refuse to acknowledge this agenda. Those for whom Lord of the Flies represents a societal ideal:

Keep your six-thousand pound SUV off publicly-funded roads. Bank and invest where there is no FDIC and SEC. Treat your own sewage. Find your own water. Process your own garbage. Buy your kids’ toys from China. Kindly purchase your meat, produce and pharmaceuticals at flea markets. Or better yet, an open air stall in Tijuana. And care for your developmentally-disabled offspring by yourself.

Fish near BP oil rigs. Work in Massey Energy coal mines. Develop your retirement plan with Bernie Madoff. Fly on planes, drive on bridges and ride in elevators with only a businessman’s promises for protection.

Ride your snowmobile to the furthest reaches of Yellowstone National Park, and dial anyone except 911 when you crash through the ice some winter afternoon. And as the hypothermia sets in, remember you got to keep everything you made.

And should your home catch fire, or a family member be fatally assaulted, we the sighted promise to do our damndest to ensure that municipal, county, state and federal governments don’t intrude and compromise your principles. And may I assume you’ve already bid adieu to Medicare and Social Security?

Thank you.

For the rest of us, small government is wealthcare dressed as populist outrage.

To be sure, government has abused taxpayers. Too often acted in the interests of a monied minority at the expense of the greater good. But to fall for the sucker punch offered by conservatives who demand its dismantling is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

This is a problem with a solution. And that solution is better government, not less.

Corporate Accountability (With Strings)

Now that we’ve accorded the rights of the individual to corporations, I’m wondering if perhaps we shouldn’t extend the liabilities as well.

Our latest corporate disaster, the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling project, presents a perfect case in point.

As a job-seeker, I am repeatedly told that cardinal sin number-one is overstating your abilities and credentials. It is grounds for no-questions-asked termination.

Yet the two failed attempts at shutting down the fountain of oil that is spewing a quarter-million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico every day clearly indicate that British Petroleum wildly overstated its capacity to deal with a problem of this magnitude.

Requiring them to absorb the cost of the clean-up and make restitution to the afflicted parties would seem to be the most-obvious solution.

Unfortunately, the guardians of the corporation that we pretend are our elected representation have limited oil company liability in these instances to just seventy-five million-dollars, or the rough equivalent of one day’s income for a company that earned six billion-dollars in the first-quarter of 2010.

Further proof of how deeply the corporate virus has infected the government of the United States would be that big oil was awarded this cap in exchange for an eight-cent-a-barrel tax on the oil they produce.

When was the last time the government asked you what concessions you needed in order to absorb a new tax? A couple of days? Months? A year or two ago?

Or never.

Publicly, BP has said all the right things. But per usual, actions speak louder than words. And BP has already begun to divest itself of culpability by insinuating that the cause of the spill lies with the out-sourced manager of the rig, Transocean Ltd.

I’m guessing BP’s squadron of highly-paid legal counsel has already begun to outline its defense strategy. And that victims won’t get paid if BP doesn’t get paid.

This ongoing tragedy will have repercussions far beyond the duration of the oil’s flow from the Gulf floor.

Most tragic is the persistent belief that allowing oil companies to drill within the United States somehow protects the United States from its dependence on foreign oil. This is the “Drill Baby, Drill!” crowd’s favorite argument.

Unfortunately, I’ve never had the opportunity to ask them why they believe oil drilled in the United States will (or even must) be sold in the United States. The naiveté is staggering.

For those blinded by the right, businesse's only allegiance is to profit. Exxon, Royal Dutch Shell and British Petroleum don’t care where the oil came from. Only where they can sell it for the best (i.e. highest) price.

There is no law which demands that oil drilled or refined in the United States must be sold in the United States. In other words, you’re not guaranteed an endless supply of gasoline for your GMC Yukon XL because it was drilled off the coast of Louisiana.

Is that plain-enough for you? Do you get it now?

So. While individuals are responsible for the claims they make, corporations with the rights of individuals have liability caps to protect them in the event their propaganda is shown to be something less than true.

God bless the Corporate States of America. I am so very thankful I have never had to defend them in war.

Private Rewards, Public Expense

I’m an idiot. Let’s get that straight right off the bat.

A pure, two-plus-two-equals-three moron. If I were anything else, I’d be rich. Or at least well-off. Because in America, the perception is brains equal cash. And since I’m broke, well, it couldn’t be more clear: I am a retard.

This is likely the reason I don’t understand business.

In contrast to their twentieth-century counterparts, twenty-first century executives seemingly exist only to eliminate jobs. Shut down factories. Close offices and distribution centers. Freeze salaries.

Business calls it cost-cutting. Belt-tightening. And my favorite, restructuring. They use the royal ‘we’. A lot. But what is rarely made clear is whose belt will be tightened. (Hint: Look down.)

As a random, out-of-the-blue example, Wausau Paper CEO Thomas Howatt serves nicely. Ol’ Tom scored a nifty 80% pay raise last year, something I doubt very many people did in 2009.

"How?" you ask.

First he eliminated 1,000 jobs. Then he froze salaries (which is a tad ironic when you consider his). Then he sat back and waited for the cash tsunami to roll in.

When asked about the questionable impact enormous executive pay raises have on workforces where salaries (where they even still exist) have been stagnant, and about being rewarded for tossing thousands onto public relief rolls, crafty Tom sniffed “I probably look at it a bit differently.”

Like I said, I’m an idiot. But shouldn’t we expect just a little bit more of our extravagantly-compensated captains of industry than payroll slashing? Do we really want to reward this behavior? Especially in a consumer-driven economy?

I have nothing against wealth. We all need our carrots, don’t we? What I have a problem with is rewarding job cuts. Isn't this is the kind of short-sightedness that has made fortunes for our national optical chains?

I think it's great that America’s CEOs have a new revenue stream to frolic in, especially with summer approaching. But I would warn them not to become too accustomed to it.

Because what happens when the only job left to slash is theirs?

You're Working Class and Conservative? Why?

I’m trying to understand working class conservatives. Really. I want to understand working class conservatives. But I can’t.

I understand wealthy and powerful conservatives. What I don’t understand are conservatives who drive Hyundais. The ones who do their own shopping. Mow their own lawns. You know, the folk who provide the GOP with numbers while remaining blissfully ignorant of the fact they’re cutting their own throats.

The best example comes from Raleigh County, West Virginia. Here’s the tragic confluence of small government, big business and a malleable electorate too addled by the sizzle to realize the steak is for someone else.

The last Republican president was a great believer in removing the reins from business and letting it run free. Pure, unfettered capitalism would cure America of all its ills.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was neutered. Likewise the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Countless regulatory agencies had their staffs and funding cut. Statutes were winked at. Protections ignored. Penalties intended to drive responsible corporate behavior were scaled-back or eliminated altogether.

Nowhere was this more true than in the coal industry.

The intimacy big coal enjoyed with the last Republican president should have aroused the suspicions of the First Lady. Advances made by generations of miners, their unions and local, state and federal governments all but disappeared under that administration.

The ultimate expression of this largesse came from Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship.

He concluded it was more cost-effective to pay the fines levied by government inspectors than to upgrade the safety infrastructure in his mines. And thanks to the small government, big business climate created by conservatives, it was.

It wasn't all bad. While guilty of thousands of violations over the past decade, no one could accuse Massey of filling their workers with propaganda like "Our employees are our most-valuable asset" could they?

As punishment, the good voters of northern Appalachia again voted Republican in the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections.

The nation’s second and third-largest coal-producing states (Kentucky and West Virginia) have become the reliable source of Republican presidential votes the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain states have been for generations.

Like battered wives, the mantra of working class conservatives seems to be don’t bite the hand that beats you.

Given the institutionalized abuse shown the working class by Republicans, this seems an extraordinarily steep price to pay for gun ownership. Or to protect fetuses until they emerge from the birth canal. Or for imposing an angry, hateful God on the population.

Actions still speak louder than words. And I still don’t understand.