Monthly Archives: December 2012

Listen To Dave: Privatization Is No Panacea

DaveEditor Emeritus Dave Zweifel has been with The Capital Times since he graduated from UW-Madison in 1962, serving as the paper’s editor in chief from 1983 to 2008. He was president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council for 15 years, served as a Pulitzer Prize judge in 2000 and 2001, and named to the Wisconsin Newspaper Hall of Fame in 2011.

The common perception among many Americans is that government simply can’t do anything right.

There are whole books of jokes that feature government as the punch line. See those three guys filling a pothole? One’s working and two are supervising. But, what the heck, that’s close enough for government work.

To be sure, there are lots of inefficiencies in some government programs and because of the sheer size of the federal government, often one hand doesn’t know what the other is doing.

We know about that because in our democracy, government is open. When a government official or a bureaucrat does something foolish or wastes valuable resources or unnecessarily spends taxpayers’ money, there are news stories about it. When defense contracts come in way over budget, it makes the news. When a government official holds a meeting at a lavish resort, it hits the press, as it should. With rare exceptions, they can’t hide their mistakes or misdeeds.

That’s not usually the case in private business. Although the mistakes are just as rampant, just as wasteful, just as irresponsible, it’s much easier to sweep the problem under the rug without anyone except the insiders knowing about it. There is no free press serving as a watchdog on private business, as is its function with government…

For every example of alleged ineptitude in government there’s an example of incompetence in the private sector. There are some things that government, working on behalf of all the people, can do better, just as there are some jobs that only private companies should do.

The challenge for us is to not yield to inaccurate perceptions, but to be able to tell the difference.

Steve Jobs On Power Of Humanities

Another reflection on the power of the arts, creativity and the humanities. This time it’s from Steve Jobs, from his presentation on the iPad 2 in early 2011. Reflecting on the success of Apple (and his own career), he said “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough — it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices.”

Power For Social Change

I’m doing a webinar on December 13 for the Northeast chapters of the National Network of Statewide Afterschool Networks on power and social change. “Are nonprofit leaders, workers and constituents doing enough to advance the causes of social change, social justice and compassion in America? How is the nonprofit sector doing, as a whole? Are we strong, healthy, powerful, fighting and winning for the kids we care so much about? Who is winning politically and policy-wise in America and what can we learn from them? Is there some uncharted territory that may hold NEW solutions to old problems in this arena?’

HSBC Too Big To Indict

From the front page of today’s New York Times:

“State and federal authorities decided against indicting HSBC in a money-laundering case over concerns that criminal charges could jeopardize one of the world’s largest banks and ultimately destabilize the global financial system.

Instead, HSBC announced on Tuesday that it had agreed to a record $1.92 billion settlement with authorities. The bank, which is based in Britain, faces accusations that it transferred billions of dollars for nations like Iran and enabled Mexican drug cartels to move money illegally through its American subsidiaries.

While the settlement with HSBC is a major victory for the government, the case raises questions about whether certain financial institutions, having grown so large and interconnected, are too big to indict. Four years after the failure of Lehman Brothers nearly toppled the financial system, regulators are still wary that a single institution could undermine the recovery of the industry and the economy.

But the threat of criminal prosecution acts as a powerful deterrent. If authorities signal such actions are remote for big banks, the threat could lose its sting.”

You think? First these criminal institutions were too big to fail. Now they’re too big to indict. Sounds like the government is granting effective immunity to banks and corporations to break the law with little effective punishment. If it’s just a fine – well, that’s now the price of doing business. A price that’s passed on to the consumer, which would be us.

Folks, these banks are accused and are guilty of money laundering to terrorist outfits, rogue states and the drug cartels. Aren’t we “at war” with those players? Not to mention tax evasion, criminal fraud, collusion, cover-ups and a pervasive culture of greed and venality. Apparently ANYTHING is OK when there is profit to be made.

Where is the outrage from America’s universities, law schools and business schools? Where is the revulsion and alarm from the columnists, pundits and politicians who have defended the market so unhesitantly?