March
2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Andrew Sullivan, The Daily Dish

Andrew Sullivan Rails on the World Economic Forum

It’s not like CEOs and billionaires (and billionaire CEOs) need any more flattery and ego-stroking than they get on a daily basis, but Davos gives them more than that: it allows them to flatter and ego-stroke each other, in public. They invariably leave even more puffed-up and sure of themselves than when they arrived, when in hindsight what the world really needed was for these men (it’s still very much a boys’ club) to be shaken out of their complacency and to ask themselves some tough questions about whether in fact they were leading us off a precipice. [Felix Salmon]

What's stunning to me, and instructive, is the distinction Tom Friedman makes today between what he calls "sustainable values" and "situational values".  I think that distinction is too kind to the bankers. What he means is what human beings used to call - before "values" replaced "virtues" - good and evil.

I have no doubt there are many good men and women working in the banking sector. But the system is so corroded with vice, with selfishness, and, most importantly, with contempt for the common good, it needs real reform. I like what Obama has proposed and what the chairman of the Bank of England is now endorsing. I think the bailouts were necessary, just as I think the stimulus was necessary. But passing the toughest financial regulation bill we can at this point seems to me to be an urgent priority. The diffuse anger out there is a function of this deep sense of injustice - and it's correct.

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Posted by Editor on 01/27/10 at 03:17 PM •  (0) Comments

Tags:  banking, corruption, billionaires, daily dish, davos, world economic forum, andrew sullivan,

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