Obama Promises Disappear from Web

Obama is great at keeping a straight face(he's a lawyer, after all), but sometimes it makes me wonder how far can he handle since there's so much dirt with all that stuff... I mean, the "The programs are transparent" is a Bush-like statement from 'the great talker', and really, he is, but he's now completely demoralized in many eyes, people from the world rooted for him, I watched the fucking debate and shared a pic of 'debate drinking game' with my friends, we all wanted that seemingly enlighted dude at this position... it's just a very ugly story, even considering that arriving there it was inevitable that he would have to give in to a shit or two or three, but it went overboard, this is a disaster in my 'very-far-away' eyes... what will it be of his name in history? What will this do for future 'enlighted-hopeful' candidates? What about the next black person running for it?

It just makes you go 'ouch'.

This whole thing to me is pretty reminiscent of Wall Street problems. I'm sure there will always be a number of economists who'll defend the situation there, who'll pedantically frame the issues in detailed legal, economic orientations but overlook the more damaging, permanent problems people at large face. Without drastic actions (e.g., handing Jamie Dimon a lengthy prison sentence; fining Halliburton something that'll seriously debilitate (but not bankrupt) their operations, an amount that will make it absolutely clear to management, shareholders and everyone else that strategies of 'play dirty, make big profit, pay relatively small fine' are completely unacceptable), I don't think we're likely to see any meaningfully positive change.

As a society we seem to just accept (and overlook) a high entropy in incarcerations of black teens caught with weed with shaky evidence. Much like how folks are okay with that, I'm pretty much okay if we start seeing a more rash justice come down upon CEOs and upper management, I'm okay seeing shareholders suffer a little, I'm okay with seeing fines in upwards of billions figure, I'm okay with the threat of nationalization looming over companies at detection of naughty behavior. And I don't think this is sloppy anarchist thinking, this is action apparently needed for a larger utilitarian interest (which in my view is generally a reasonable goal).

Okay, that sounded a little extreme, but tell me, how else can we tell them we're not putting up with bullshit anymore? How things are currently going is obviously not working very well.

> Do you randomly prosecute the CEO, simply by virtue of his position, for activity you can't directly pin on him? If you do this, watch every multi-national rush to re-incorporate in Switzerland.

Great. Another one will pop up in its place, who we should reward if they uphold higher ethical standards by doing business with them.

By and large, black teens aren't incarcerated on "shakey evidence." That's the great thing about crimes that affect poor people: they're really easy to prove. The difference between an aggressive deal/outright fraud/honest mistake is difficult to prove. Who knew what? When? What were they thinking? Possession of an uncontrolled substance? Felon in possession of a firearm? Robbery? That stuff is easy to prove.

Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think it's okay that we imprison so many low-income minorities. But I don't think its the result of "high-entropy" prosecutions based on "shakey evidence." It's the result of astronomical sentences and three-strikes rules for relatively minor crimes (drugs, theft, gang activity) that are very common among low income populations.

> Great. Another one will pop up in its place,

Because we're doing such a great job keeping businesses in America as it is? All that will happen is that the capital will slowly migrate elsewhere.

> But tell me, how else can we tell them we're not putting up with bullshit anymore?

The fact of the matter is that we don't have any choice. My mentor in law school once pointed out to me that in Illinois politics, large companies don't have to make campaign donations to exercise their political clout. All they do is call up a state legislator and say: "I create 300 jobs in your district; this is how high you're going to jump." And the legislators ask: "how high?"

And the people absolutely will not do anything about it, because far and away their #1 political concern is getting a job or keeping their job. And no government official is going to be stupid enough to do something like punish a corporation overly harshly because a simple ad along the lines of "so and so cost such and such county in Illinois 300 jobs!" is a nuclear weapon in the current economy.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Rightist_Movement

Prisoners of war have legal rights too, under treaties to which the US is signatory. The Gitmo prisoners are not receiving those rights either. They're in a legal no-man's-land.