Many have alleged that there is an ungracious, vindictive and avidly un-American attitude with which a Nixonian Karl Rove-lead Administration has investigated, intimidated and otherwise attempted to destroy anyone who isn't aligned with its political agenda. This may or may not be the case. But what I find more significant is the agenda itself. And if a victor can be described generally as a person or corporation with considerable capital, (political or otherwise), the agenda seems fairly simple and straight-forward: "To the victor go the spoils."

Dick Cheney is the CEO of Halliburton. There is a multi-million dollar accounting scandal. The company is mired in product liability lawsuits because it exposed thousands of workers to deadly asbestos. The company could go the way of Enron, but Chaney becomes vice-President. Congress seeks special legislation shielding asbestos makers. Halliburton gets the contract to rebuild Iraq. To the victor go the spoils.

Banks, who knowingly and intentionally overextended credit to and encouraged overspending by consumers, give record amounts to the Bush campaign. The bankruptcy laws are changed so that regular people will not be able to discharge their debts. Yet they don't change the Bankruptcy Code for large corporations, like Enron, or United Airlines, who can continue to bail themselves out at the expense of former employees, pension plan investors, and other folks who have outstanding balances that will go unpaid.

Ordinary people fight a war, which generates profits for defense contractors and oil companies. Yet the government, at the same time, cuts veterans benefits, and opposes POWs seeking compensation from Japanese conglomerates who turned them into slaves during World War II. The oil industry sees record profits, and new drilling opportunities in the Arctic, while ordinary people pay record prices for gas and heating oil.

Drug companies and HMOs get immunity from lawsuits, while ordinary people who lose their family members due to aggressive off-label promotion or assembly-line medicine are left without hope.

The inheritance tax, capital gains taxes, and other taxes for the wealthy are cut or repealed altogether, leaving a bigger tax burden for the middle class.

And the list goes on....

Maybe, someday, some of this good fortune will "trickle down" to the rest of us.

In the meantime: "To the victor go the spoils."




[Notes - The views expressed on this political blog and legal blog regarding corporate welfare, trickle-down or supply-side economics, and tort reform are the personal views of Steve Herman and are not intended to represent the views of Herman Herman Katz & Cotlar, LTLA, TLPJ, the Civil Justice Foundation, or any other organization.]

“A subsidiary of Halliburton, Kellogg Brown & Root Services, has ben awarded $30 million to build a 220-bed prison for terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Pentagon announced Friday. The prison is to include day rooms, exercise areas and medical bays.” The Associated Press, New York Times, June 19, 2005, p.21.

“This is a purported regular guy who is the scion of privilege and whose resume owes more to the family tree than the grindstone. A fiscal conservative who has blown the deficit and government spending sky-high. A candidate who said he was not interested in nation-building undertaking it aggressively.... Look at the Inaugural, close to $40 million worth of parties, pageantry and canapes paid for by corporate largesse and said to be in honor of our troops, who families are struggling to get by.” Anna Quindlen, Newsweek, Jan. 10, 2005, p.64.

As a Vietnam Veteran, I believe that the final two sentences of Anna Quindlen's Oct. 31 column perfectly express the political essence of both my war and the war the country is fighting now. She writes, "American sons and daughters are dying to protect the egos of those men whose own children are safe at home. Again." I might add that the egos to which she refers belong almost exclusively to people who avoided service during Vietnam while mostly supporting that war. To those who say this country has no class system, I say look who fights - and doesn't fight - our modern wars.

- M.R. Kerley, Atlanta, Georgia.

[Printed in Newsweek, Nov. 14, 2005, p.18.]

Dick Siegel of the Weekly World News reports that Dick Cheney's heart attacks have made President Bush increasingly afraid that stress would kill him too, so he has authorized a secret billion-dollar-a-year budget for a clandestine "Project Immortality" lab, to develop a vaccine against death for those few "who possess the skills and the right to direct the fate of the world." The immortality vaccine developed has side effects: While the body stays healthy, the brain will quickly shrivel to the size of a raisin. "The vice president didn't seem to mind, though. He and the monkey sat blissfully exchanging hand signals while Mr. Chaney kept repeating the word 'Vootie!'"

"There's just a one-letter difference between 'immortality' and what these people stand for" the confidential White House insider commented in conclusion. "I hope the American punlic will realize that 300 Million of themhave been paying dearly for the comfort of the relative few."

Discussing the Fed's recent efforts to rescue the hedge fund and money managers who had unwisely invested in the subprime lending industry by flooding the market with cheap cash, Surowiecki notes that:

"There is something unseemly about watching the avatars of free-market capitalism rely on the government to pay for their bad bets."


See James Surowicki, "Beware Bailouts" The New Yorker, Aug. 27, 2007, p.33.

“A ‘dismal’ new jobs report makes it official, says Paul Krugman in the New York Times. ‘The Bush boom, such as it was, has run its course,’ and Americans now face the prospect of a recession. The Labor Department announced in September that, contrary to expectations of modest growth, the United States actually lost 4,000 jobs in August, the first employment drop since 2003. The fact that the economy is now running in reserve puts a lie to the Bush Administration’s central article of economic faith: that by lowering taxes on corporations and the rich, the economy grows and all Americans benefit. Corporate profits surged 72% and the income of the richest 0.1% jumped 51% in just two years – while wages for the average American were stagnant, and health care benefits declined. In ‘trickle down’ economics, prosperity at the top is supposed to help the rest of us. Now middle class Americans are wondering: ‘Where’s my trickle?’”

This is not to suggest that any person or company makes “too much” money, nor that there is anything that we or the Government should do about it.

It is only to suggest that tax breaks and other subsidies which tend favor the wealthy are generally not good investments for the poor and middle class citizens who ultimately pay for them.

The dividends of tax cuts, tort reform, regulatory relief and pork barrel corporate welfare projects tend to linger in the pockets of the companies and owners who lobby for them.

So when some politician or pundit tells you that the sacrifices you make for people who shouldn’t need your help will “lift all boats” (including, particular, yours), don’t be so quick to believe them.


[See Paul Krugman, The New York Times, as quoted in The Week, Sept. 21, 2007, p.20.]