Why Pigs Shouldn't Fly

If anyone hasn't already, you should really listen to Democracy Now's segment last Friday, https://www.democracynow.org/…/profits_should_not_come_befo…

The segment included statements made by the lawyer and family of Samya Stumo, who along with another 156 innocent passengers died in the Ethiopian Airlines crash last month. Bottom line, the crash was decidedly not a result of a tragic "accident" but rather as a result of "'...Boeing's decision to put profits over safety … and the regulators that enabled it, must be held accountable for their reckless actions.'" These poor folks all assumed, mistakenly as it turns out, that U.S. airplane manufacturers really do put safety first, and that the U.S. Government regulatory agencies provide meaningful oversight to ensure that they do. Wrong and wrong again,.

May G-d rest all of their souls in peace.

I won't make this a long post. Suffice it to say that this example of corporate criminal malfeasance confirmed for me a few things, which have been apparent to me for a loooong time:

1. Business is in business to be in business. It cares nary a whit for the welfare of its consumers above and beyond what the beancounters tell them they need to do to reduce their exposure to legal liability. Anything above and beyond that is a pointless waste of money, which could be going to fatten up the earnings of C-suite execs and major shareholders.
2. Self-regulation by the private sector is a farce. It's worse than letting the fox into the hen house. It's tying the hens down so that the fox doesn't have to work too hard to rip the poor fowl to shreds.
3. The USG - both the executive and legislative branches - is a servile lackey to corporate interests, especially when it comes to anything associated with the military-industrial complex (N.B. that would include Boeing).

So the next time some blowhard starts crowing about "the private sector" and how it does things so much more efficiently than the public sector, tell'em to stick a sock in it. Tell'em that corporate America is nothing more than a bunch of thieving amoral con artists - sound like someone (orange) we know? - who would happily sell their own families to medical experiment if it meant boosting their P/E ratio.

I'm hoping there's a special place for these folks in the big BBQ downstairs where they spend eternity reflecting on the consequences of their narcissistic sociopathic pursuit of lucre.

Hope, too, that somebody remember to bring the Stubb's...