The Corporate Idea Of Partnership With A Sovereign State
As reported by Glenn Greenwald in Salon online magazine, White House adviser David Axelrod appeared on Meet the Press to discuss things, and tried very hard to explain to NBC/MSNBC's David Gregory the concept of holding someone accountable, which Gregory didn't seem to understand. At all.
That might be funny, if Gregory wasn't the chief White House correspondent for that network. Perhaps I'm mistaken in my assumption, but I thought working that kind of beat meant you understood the differences between government, and business, when it comes to a situation like the Gulf Oil Spill.
Dancin' Dave Gregory, NBC's Chief White House Correspondent
And The Host Of Meet The Press On Sundays (Photo: NBC)
So, in discussing The Spill on FTN, Gregory did what nearly all "modern broadcast journalists" do: He focused, not on the continuing despoiling of marine and wetlands ecosystems, and a fishing and tourist industry, but on his assumption that the U.S. government's response is really all about personalities.
It's so much simpler, 'sexier', to talk about whether the President likes British Petroleum CEO, Tony Hayward. As chief White House NBC Guy, you wouldn't want to raise the level of discussion about how the representative government of a sovereign state deals with a corporate entity over issues of liability.
No; leave that to the eggheads on PBS. Aber natürlich, you would want to know the real details -- like, what Michelle Obama was wearing when told Tony Hayward and his BP Crew would be coming to the White House.
MR. GREGORY: Does the president trust this guy [Hayward]?
MR. AXELROD: Well, look, it's not a matter of who -- we, we -- it's not a matter of trust. We have to verify what they're doing, we have to stay on them, and we have from the beginning. That's why we want this escrow account. I'm not here to, to make judgments about any individual's character, but we do know that they have pecuniary interests that may be in conflict with, with the interests of, of our interests, and we...
MR. GREGORY: But, but...
MR. AXELROD: ...need to make sure that the interests of people in the Gulf are protected. That is what our job is.
MR. GREGORY: But this is a straightforward question. If you are in partnership with somebody -- and make no mistake, the government is in partnership with BP to get this problem solved -- does the, does the president of the United States trust the man on the other end who is leading this operation?
MR. AXELROD: Our, our mission here is to hold them accountable in, in every appropriate way... I don't consider them a partner, I don't consider them -- they're not social friends, they're not -- I'm not looking to make judgments about their soul. I just want to make sure that they do what they're required to do.
Let me add an observation from Jay Ackroyd at The Great Curmudgeon:
Deep in what only can be called the ideology of Washington, DC is the idea that the government's role with respect to large corporations is as a partner. Regulatory agencies do not demand compliance with the law. Rather they work with their business partners in some kind of mutual interest.
...much of our difficulties to date stem directly from the idea that the way to fix problems is to partner up with industry -- the NSA with the telcos, HHS with the insurance and drug companies, MMS with the oil companies, Treasury and the banksters -- to deliver "private sector" solutions.
Of course, they say "free market [solutions]," but this kind of thing is pretty much the opposite of a free market, and is... a distance away from [what] anyone would generally mean by "liberal" or "progressive."
Large profit-making entities do not have the public interest at heart; they (at best) care about their shareholders' dividends. The notion that the relationship between them and the government should be accommodating, rather than adversarial is quite a radical shift away from the views of FDR or LBJ.
But this notion runs deep. It is so strong in Dancin' Dave that it is like a fish's awareness of water. He seems to be literally unable to understand what Axelrod means by accountability.
NBC, the broadcast network who employs Dancin' Dave, is just another asset of the Westinghouse Corporation. Once upon a time, the National Broadcasting Corporation understood the difference between its News and Entertainment divisions, and journalists more or less believed in a factually-based world.
That hasn't been the case for some time now. Truth, and accountability, are malleable. Corporations have the same rights as individuals (don't believe me? Go ask 'Tight Tony' Scalia, Oreo Tommy, Joey 'Fingers' Alito and Chief Justice Roberts if it isn't so).
Rather than hold corporations accountable; instead of using even Reagan's laughable "trust, but verify"; we should simply allow businesses to conduct business, and accept their solemn promises that -- like Itchy the Mouse's promise to Scratchy the Cat on The Simpsons -- They Will Never, Ever Hurt Us.
How'd that work out with BP in the Gulf, by the way? The same way it did with Blackwater in Iraq? The same way it did with the BSD's on Wall Street? Yeah...
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