tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060417.post3530450902479049624..comments2023-11-05T06:18:25.377-06:00Comments on The Privatopia Papers: Modification blunders bedevil U.S. housing recovery - Yahoo! NewsEvan McKenziehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04479661304143631524noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060417.post-66025222337137518412011-12-24T15:00:35.885-06:002011-12-24T15:00:35.885-06:00"I admire its purity. A survivor... unclouded..."I admire its purity. A survivor... unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality."<br /><br />is<br /><br />(a) a disciple of Ayn Rand describing corporations<br /><br />(b) science officer Ash describing the xenomorph in the 1979 movie "<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078748/quotes?qt=qt0460434" rel="nofollow">Alien</a>"<br /><br />(c) all of the aboveAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5060417.post-26183305149839630702011-12-18T11:50:04.478-06:002011-12-18T11:50:04.478-06:00> There is no way banks will do anything volunt...> There is no way banks will do anything voluntarily <br />> unless it makes them bigger and richer. <br />> The fact that they have been bailed out <br />> by the taxpayers from the costs of <br />> their own mistakes is of no consequence to them. <br />> They just want more.<br /><br />The idea that <a href="http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/114483/" rel="nofollow">corporations have no moral obligations</a> to anyone other than their shareholders is what makes them <a href="http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/114027/" rel="nofollow">a thing of beauty</a> to conservatives and libertarians.<br /><br /><i>Corporations have no social duty<br />Except to those who own their stock<br />…<br />Corporations are amoral<br />Corporate conscience is impossible<br />The corporation really has no choice<br />...<br />So if you want your freedom<br />Let the corporate seize the day<br />There really is no better way</i><br />-- <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3Seg0JE1PM" rel="nofollow">The Milton Friedman Choir</a><br /><br />If <a href="http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/249055/september-15-2009/the-word---let-freedom-ka-ching" rel="nofollow">corporations were people</a>, this lack of conscience, empathy, morality, (to some) a soul *, <i>etc.</i>, would make corporations, by definition, sociopaths.<br /><br />Oh wait? <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood" rel="nofollow">Corporations <i>are</i> people</a>?! Is concentrating more wealth and power into the hands of sociopaths a good idea?<br /><br />As a reader of "The Daily [Ron] Paul" put it, "<a href="http://www.dailypaul.com/107375/stephen-colbert-on-corporate-personhood" rel="nofollow">we made up fictitious entities and exempted them from the chains that bind normal people.</a>"<br /><br />I find it interesting that the two most influential novelists among the libertarian/Tea Party movement are Ayn Rand and Robert Heinlein, yet they had diametrically opposed viewpoints on the individual's role in and moral obligations to the larger society they lived in. Contrast the motives of the protagonists in "Atlas Shrugged" to "Starship Troopers" (the book, not the movie).<br /><br /><br />* There's a sign that's popular at the "Occupy" protests that says "I'll believe corporations are people when Texas executes one." Perhaps "I'll believe corporations are people when God lets one into Heaven" might be more appropriate for the audience the sign-holders are trying to persuade.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com