You should probably read the report and get your fill of the seamy side of capital hill. The combination of power and sexual access is intoxicating. It is hard to do the right thing when there is just so much money and so much temptation. That, of course, is not an excuse.
James Pilant
Special thanks to NotionsCaptital.
via NotionsCapital
Seldom has a politician been so up front about his contempt for the masses –
From the essay –
On April 26th, the 25th anniversary of the catastrophic Chernobyl accident, Berlusconi held a press conference with French president Nikolay Sarkozy in Rome. At this press conference Berlusconi made his radioactive intentions clear for all. “We are absolutely convinced that nuclear energy is the future for the whole world,” he said. He went on to detail how recent polls showed that the referendum to block nuclear power for decades to come could pass at this time and that by temporarily suspending Italy’s return to nuclear program the issue would be revisited when the Italian voters had been “calmed down” and returned to the realization that Nuclear Energy was the most viable and safe way to produce electricity. He went on to explain how the “leftists and ecologists” had manipulated the emotions of the Italian voters after Chernobyl and penalized the Italian people who have to pay higher electric rates than France that operates 58 nuclear power plants. Berlusconi explained that the “situation in Japan had scared the Italian voters” and that the “inevitable return to nuclear power in Italy” would not be abandoned nor would the collaborations between Enel and Eletricite de France.
You see voters have no wisdom and judgment. When they err by disagreeing with you, for instance, their failure to realize that nuclear power is “viable and safe,” that can be fixed. If you have the media, you just patiently convince them of your point of view. You don’t worry about their judgment because there is nothing that cannot be fixed by good PR.
It would be difficult to find more open contempt for the democratic process or the facts of the situation. If nuclear power is going to be safe, there is some work that is going to have to be done. If that isn’t obvious based on the last twenty years, where have you been hiding?
James Pilant
via Aletho News
Here we have an analysis of a moral conundrum. Is it okay to take something of small value? Even if it is very small in value? The analysis here results in a finding of “still wrong whatever size.”
I agree with that.
But follow the line of reasoning and see if you would have worked through it the same way. It’s interesting.
James Pilant
via Kevin Benko
Removing top soil from school grounds to reduce radiation is a positive step. It does however provide a small harbinger of the enormous cost this disaster is going to impose in Japan for as much future as humans can reasonably foresee.
Generally nations recover from floods, chemical spills, rock slides, etc. and dare I say it, combinations of tsunami and earthquakes. Japan may recover economically but the damage to the land is permanent unless you look at history in terms of periods like the Jurassic.
It is questionable business ethics to promote PR that claims such disasters unlikely or impossible. It is questionable business ethics to subvert the government into downplaying or covering up incidents at your nuclear plants. It is questionable business ethics to pretend certainty when you don’t have any.
I expect giant corporations to lie, exaggerate and steal if at all possible. (Small corporations are much less likely to have these faults and are in many cases, excellent examples of morality and patriotism.) But permanently destroying the landscape has to considered unethical in an extreme sense.
James Pilant
Apparently being Un-American is not a matter of disagreeing with an energy company. A major corporation, Conoco Phillips, has discovered what makes an American and what does not.
Their conclusion runs as follows – If you oppose government subsidies for oil companies you are Un-American.
Conoco Phillips under intense questioning before Congress refuses to retract or apologize for this statement which by the way is in one of their press releases.
I would imagine it only makes sense to the company. They apparently consider the well-being of the company, profitability, to be an American value.
I believe that large multinational corporations believe that the United States serves to advance their interests and has no other purpose worth noting. Their adamant refusal to pay taxes, their attacks on public expenditures, their desire to speculate rather than creating value, their contempt and hatred for American workers and their unceasing efforts to turn the government into a subsidiary all point to a certain state of mind.
A bystander might consider a company that preaches free enterprise at every opportunity and yet makes a considerable portion of its profit from government subsidies might be at the least considered hypocritical or at the most, Un- American.
James Pilant
via The Local Crank
I found this essay to mirror some of my concerns. I try to point out to my classes (I teach college) that identifying with and having sympathy for criminals and wrong doers is usually wrong and when not directly wrong, questionable.
I remember my shock when asking my students who their heroes were and one young lady said the Hannibal Lector character in Red Dragon. After a long pause during which I tried to collect my thoughts, I pointed out that this might not be a good choice. I have also pointed out to my students that you hang pirates, that pirates do not sail in endless circles in the Caribbean on a kind of Carnivale Cruise Line vacation but sail to kill people and take their stuff. They find this a strange thought.
I tell them that your moral judgment has to be turned on all the time to be effective and that it requires considerable effort to do so after having been conditioned to root for the “hero” in thousands of television shows. As with all teaching I wonder how much I get across.
This a good article which takes the side of moral responsibility.
James Pilant
My thanks to Attacking the Page.
From the article –
Basically, codes are the rules we use to govern the way we want to live. Our codes of honor, ethics and conduct make up our conscious. They give us a moral compass for orienteering our way though life. Right or wrong, we all have a philosophy by which we live. And so should our characters.
This article refers and provides a link to the endowment effect. I had never heard of this economic theory. But now having read about it, I find it both fascinating and convincing. I appreciate the author bringing this idea to my attention.
I did not stop at reading this particular post, I explored the site reading a good number of posts. I very much enjoyed what I saw. I think you would profit by a similarly detailed look.
James Pilant
I have read that knowing the right questions may well be better than knowing the answers. This is because you can always ask the questions again when circumstances change and what used to be the answers is now irrelevant.
These are good questions.
I liked the opening comments about War and Peace. I never was able to get very far with it either but I did see the Russian six-hour movie. Maybe that counts.
James Pilant
Special thanks to Cognitive Noise (The best blog title I have seen in quite some time.)
via Cognitive Noise
I’ve been seeing these scams on the web and occasionally hearing them on the radio. These scammers are like vultures circling over people already in financial difficulties to extract their last dollar.
Business ethics? There really isn’t much to say. The people who run these scams are merely low life scum without any intention of providing any legitimate service. If there is no legitimate service in the first place, we are talking fraud.
If you are in foreclosure or near foreclosure – Follow the advice in this article.
James Pilant
In India, they are having a nation wide discussion, a debate over what can be done about corruption in that country. They have policemen who take bribes apparently as a regular part of their income. They have governmental scandals involving utterly incredible amounts of money.
Here we don’t have much of that kind of corruption. Because of this we think of ourselves as a less corrupt nation. In fact, we think highly of ourselves here in the United States.
But the kind of corruption we see here, it’s the really high quality kind. It’s legal. It’s incredibly profitable. And it conveys with complete accuracy the decay of our society and continuing decline in any level of trust for the government or business. More and more, they look more like a joint conspiracy than any attempt at the common welfare or simple profits.
Talking about business ethics is almost humorous. Almost.
James Pilant
Pilant's Business Ethics Blog 
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