Market Based Morality?

I wouldn't underestimate you, Aaron. And I don't want to administer a beating. I want to understand what he's saying. He's not hiding - he never has He's formulating an answer.

ohio county wrote:I wouldn't underestimate you, Aaron. And I don't want to administer a beating. I want to understand what he's saying. He's not hiding - he never has He's formulating an answer.

The difference between you and I is that you are politically correct, I am not. I call a spade a spade. And I wonder, if it takes days to formulate a response, what's the point in responding at all?

ohio county wrote:If I understand Aaron correctly he is asking you what the public-sector unions in Wisconsin have to do with avaricious corporations. I am loath to speak for him because he does pretty well for himself..

Aaron is asking me to accept his premise that corporations are not "taxpayers". If corporations are not taxpayers, why do corporations focus so much and spend so much on lobbying to have taxes not increase and/or be lower?

I believe that your concern with corporations borders on obsession.

That could be. Does that make such an "obsession" irrelevant? I believe that corporations' are obsessed with having their bidders control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees. When I go to the WV state legislature on certain lobby says, I do not see your referenced blue-haired little old ladies wearing tennis shoes among the hordes of lobbyists. I see mostly male, "stripey suited" (to use a Shermanism) lobbyists identified by the registered lobbyists handbook and spending reports as representing and paid by- quess what- by corporations. By any reasonable measure, corporations are a major player in American economics and politics- including in Wisconsin.

Corporations are neither good nor evil. Any good corporate officer will tell you that his primary function is to increase the wealth of the stockholders. And who are these superrich stockholders? Sometimes they are blue-haired little old ladies who might wear tennis shoes. Sometimes they are union pension funds. Sometimes they are investors in 401k accounts planning for their retirements. Sometimes they are institutional investors and sometimes they are individuals. When the investors invest dollars the evil corporations are truly color-blind and unbiased.

Corporations are indeed good or evil- based on what they do and don't do and allow or dis-allow in their names. It seems to me that to say that corporations are color blind and unbiased is to suggest that the people those corporations represent are color-blind and unbiased.

They see only dollars and not interest groups or races or religions.

Each corporation is its own interest group. Collectively- as in the local, state or national Chambers of Commerce, for example- corporations have a collective agenda of, as you say, increasing their wealth.

Are corporations greedy? No, they gauge their success or failure on net returns or returns on capital investments. Cash is simply how they keep score.

If cash is the only measure of success or failure, then what about empathy and concern for fairness to current and future generations? How / why do people lose their natural propensities for good and/or evil because they form a corporation?

Are executives over-compensated? Well, isn't that a question for the stockholders to answer? Why would we concern ourselves with that question if we are not stockholders in that corporation?

For the same reason that many Libyans concern themselves with the self over-compensation of Khadafy compared to the "compensation" of lower and middle class Libyans.

Stakeholders in a corporate controlled economic system are not limited to stockholders of those controlling corporations. Stakes is what corporations do are not limited to monetary investments in the corporations. Stakes include the need for every human being in an economic system to a fair share of the environmental capital that is invested in corporate activities through consumption of environmental resources and through needless pollution of other environmental resources . These stakes cannot be measured in dollars which- as you point out- are the only way corporations keep score. Stakes also include the human labor that goes into corporate dollars, of course. And the stakes also include the parts of the economy that are not bound into corporate capital and corporate consumption.

Friedrich A. von Hayek showed in his Nobel Prize winning work, The Road to Serfdom, that the amount of central planning in a state's economy has an equal and opposite reaction in the level of individual liberties of the citizens of that state. And this in the days when they held the quaint conceit that one had to produce the work before winning the prize.

I have not read Hayek. But I would observe that "central planning" is not limited to government planning. Corporate planning is also a kind of "central planning". And when the government becomes the implementer of corporate plans, we have nothing less than central planning.

To proselytize for socialism is to ignore one hundred fifty years of history. That socialism is all the rage now on the Continent and the East Coast notwithstanding, there has never been a purely socialist state whose citizens would freely vote to maintain it.

I agree as relates to state socialism. But corporations themselves are socialist structures- complete with central planning and internal central controls.

Finally, and at long last, what does the dust-up in Wisconsin have to do with corporations?

I think Aaron answers that question well when he insists that to talk intelligently about Wisconsin we need to somehow pretend that corporations are not taxpayers. Corporations and their stockholders are among taxpayers with the highest stakes- with both corporate profits and the benefits accruing to those over-compensated executives you mention at stake.

Thank you for the kind words. I have nothing but respect for you and believe you are exactly what you say you are. I certainly do not bear you any malice or disrespect

I appreciate that. And I appreciate that you (usually) take my words at face value and don't try to spin what I do say into something I didn't say. As I have said before, your comments often have the good effect of causing me to think about what I think about. Accordingly, the reports of me being off into hiding from your questions are erroneous.

Cash is simply how they keep score.

It's the same way in a poker game. But how do poker players "keep score" of the grief the wives and children of players endure because daddy/ hubby is off playing poker instead of spending quality time with their families? How do they measure the family misery when dad loses his whole paycheck in a poker game? My point is not that I am "obsessed" with poker- but to point out that more is at stake than what can be measured by simply counting dollars at the end of the night.

It is the same with corporations. Both the good and the bad results of corprorate activities on all of society go far beyond that measured by returns or losses to that blue-haired little old lady in tennis shoes and to other investers of capital (money) in the corporation.

I suppose here's where I fancy myself the moderate, Zig. I think some degree of regulation makes perfect sense of corporations, who indeed, use profit to keep score. The point is to keep that level of regulation minimal enough that making the right decision and the profitable one are not mutually exclusive.

We lose our manufacturing jobs overseas because making anything in the US is too much of a hassle.

Consider the railroads. I live right on the Rock Island Line, a train line that carries freight but 70 years ago carried people to and from Chicago four times a day. Well, they say they can bring back passenger service to this area within 10 years. The rails are there. 10 years? Are they high?

Now instead of riding low pollution trains, folks down here will continue to take their cars and go to work to jobs not making anything because our "business climate" has proven hostile toward any kind of livin wage-producing industry. Meanwhile, we all exist selling hamburgers to each other, while industry moves to countries where they pollute even more.

Corporations are not immoral; they are amoral. Make it truly in their best interest to act responsibly, and they will surely do so. Make it a hassle to employ Americans (or produce oil, or power, or what have you), and we all suffer.

I suppose here's where I fancy myself the moderate, Zig. I think some degree of regulation makes perfect sense of corporations, who indeed, use profit to keep score. The point is to keep that level of regulation minimal enough that making the right decision and the profitable one are not mutually exclusive.

I agree. I could not have said it better.

We lose our manufacturing jobs overseas because making anything in the US is too much of a hassle.

If the primary corporate consideration is the "hassle" it avoids instead of the "hassle" it creates, then we are better off letting it go overseas where it can "hassle" the world around it without enduring the "hassle" of pesky rules and regulations of the people who demand less "hassle" from the corporation.

Corporations are not immoral; they are amoral. Make it truly in their best interest to act responsibly, and they will surely do so. Make it a hassle to employ Americans (or produce oil, or power, or what have you), and we all suffer.

All of life is a "hassle". "Hassle" goes both ways- being created, and being endured. If the way to avoid the "hassle" of being a good corporate citizen is to take the "hassle" of corporate excesses from a nation that tries to control them to a nation that allows it, then I take exception to your assertion that corporations are amoral.

Corporations are not machines. Corporations are collectives of people- just as churches are people, labor unions are people, 4-H clubs are people.

And the collectives of people- whether called corporations or called churches or 4-H clubs- just like individual people, are as moral or immoral as their actions attest- not one bit more, not one bit less.

I disagree with the precept that corporations are inherently evil, which is the standard view of the extreme left and has been for more then 100 years. I encounter in every day in academia from both those who are entrusted with teaching and fellow students. Like our resident Marxist, just the mere existence of such entities is unacceptable.

It's been my experience that if one knows the answer before they ask the question then there's no use asking the question. Such is the case for those who rant and rave about the evil of corporations and cite examples like Enron and Massey but what they fail to mention is that these examples are only a small percentage of all United States corporations.

They ignore that the overwhelming majority of corporations, more then 99% abide by the law, employee citizens, provide a product or service and are responsible for the large portion of tax revenue in this country. They ignore these very simple facts because to do otherwise puts a chink in their preconceived agenda and screws up the answers to the questions before they’re ask.

They also fail to mention that the overwhelming majority of wrongdoing involving corporations has nothing to do with a lack or regulation or control by the government but instead is the fault of illegal actions by individuals. Enron for example came about not because of a lack of regulations or accounting rules (which were changed in the early 1990's under the guise of making business more transparent and prevent this type of incident but all those regulations did was contribute to our housing market crisis) but because a few individuals lied and weren’t brought down until someone else decided to tell the truth.

No amount of regulation or control can stop someone from lying and acting illegal if that is what they choose to do but instead of our government reacting responsibility, their answer was Sarbanes-Oxley which added additional layers of red tape and drastically increased the cost of doing business for all publically traded companies.

But when this is brought to light and the effect these actions have on business by increasing cost for consumers, the response is similar to the garbage above, “then we are better off letting it go overseas where it can "hassle" the world around it without enduring the "hassle" of pesky rules and regulations of the people who demand less "hassle" from the corporation.” Horse hockey.

Another issue the far left is not willing to admit is that much of the wrongdoing of corporations results from corruption of oversight. The explosiong at UBB and Massey Energy is the perfect example of this.

Yes, Massey has had safety issues for years, all known by and accepted by MSHA. In fact, is it MSHA's lax oversight and all their inspectors allow to go unchecked that results in tradegies like that at UBB? A significant contributing factor to the explosion was the amount of coal dust present in the mine but at no point was the mine shut down for those problems. They were allowed to continue operations despite known violations.

After the fact, the question was ask why this mine wasn’t shut down for a clear pattern of violations and we were told it was a computer glitch and that the ultimate fault fell on Massey and Don Blankenship's fault even though MSHA knew of these problems and dropped the ball for 2 plus years.

Please. That's garbage and anyone with half a brain knows it. MSHA is as culpable as Massey and Don Blankenship for those 29 men’s lives but no government employee will ever be held accountable.

All we here from the left is how bad the corporation are while those very same individuals absolve government regulators of any responsibility for their wrongdoing. To admit the truth would admit fault with government and we all know no liberal has the courage to do that.

The last thing I'll say is about the continued crying regarding lobbyist. You can blame corporations and say that lobbyist and the money spent is the problem but what you fail to grasp is that there ain't anything that can be bought if it ain't for sale to begin with. If you truly want to reign in lobbyist then it begins with expecting our government representatives to act ethical and not sell their selves out to the highest bidder.

Ronald Reagan was right, government isn’t part of the solution, they’re part of the problem and the sooner we as a nation get back to those principals, the better off we’ll all be.

When I go to the WV state legislature on certain lobby says, I do not see your referenced blue-haired little old ladies wearing tennis shoes among the hordes of lobbyists. I see mostly male, "stripey suited" (to use a Shermanism) lobbyists identified by the registered lobbyists handbook and spending reports as representing and paid by- quess what- by corporations. By any reasonable measure, corporations are a major player in American economics and politics- including in Wisconsin.

Do you mean to say lobby "days"? I think that's a typo but I'm not absolutely sure what you mean there.

I never said the blue-haired little ladies were lobbyists. I said they were investors and, therefore, owners of corporations. When you go to the Legislature and see all these male-inhabited stripey suits, how do you know they're not there representing AFSCME and the NEA? I suspect that even Shermangeneral, himself, would have donned the stripey pants uniform of the Legislature if he had official business there. When in Rome, eh?

I believe that corporations' are obsessed with having their bidders control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees.

Please. Corporations have legitimate and bona fide reasons to lobby their governments. Just as you do. Just as any citizens do. You say "collectives". That is a curious choice of words. Not wrong. Just curious. Corporations are associations of individuals. Are union lobbyists all as exemplary and selfless as corporate lobbyists are avaricious and self-serving?

I suspect that if I were a democrat I'd see nothing wrong with unions spending millions to elect democrats who are expected to capitulate to the union's demands. Even FDR, the uncrowned king of liberals opposed public-sector unions.

“It is impossible to bargain collectively with the government.” George Meany.

I don't have a problem with private-sector unions putting a brake on corporations. That is not what happens with public-sector unions. They make their demands on the public. Wisconsin does not seek to curb the public-sector unions' ability to bargain collectively for wages (although I'd like to see that curbed, too). They seek to impose the members' increased contributions to their health care and to their pensions more in line with the contributions that Americans of every stripe make. The hype and hyperbole are shrill and distracting. They do not add anything to the debate.

But this: "...control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees..." bothers me immensely. I belonged to a corporate PAC. We never discussed any public employees at all. Nor did we seek to control all of government either virtually or in practical effect. We did have grievances which we sought to redress.

Post script:

I don't have a problem with private-sector unions putting a brake on corporations. That is not what happens with public-sector unions. They make their demands on the public.

And governments who negotiate with public-sector unions are ignorant of and free from the requirements of corporations to make a profit and control costs.

No, corporations using central planning are not socialistic enterprises. Their planning centers exclusively on their profit margins, cash flow, stock prices and not the distribution of goods and services to society at large. I can say with some confidence that corporations that allow local control as opposed to central planning enjoy greater success and increased flexibility.

ohio county wrote:Do you mean to say lobby "days"? I think that's a typo but I'm not absolutely sure what you mean there.

Yes, lobby days. Sorry for the typo.

I never said the blue-haired little ladies were lobbyists. I said they were investors and, therefore, owners of corporations.

As I am. And I want the corporations I invest in to be good corporate public citizens.

When you go to the Legislature and see all these male-inhabited stripey suits, how do you know they're not there representing AFSCME and the NEA?

Some of them are, of course. The required picture/name badges tell us who they are and who they represent- as does the legislature's handbook of paid lobbyists. But I do not see zillions nor even dozens of the affected "taxpayers" that you and Aaron suggest are somehow not associated with corporations.

I suspect that even Shermangeneral, himself, would have donned the stripey pants uniform of the Legislature if he had official business there. When in Rome, eh?

I don't. Why would he have done so- though I am not sure what you mean by "official business"? Is unpaid, individual citizen lobbying somehow less "formal" than paid corporate or other organizational lobbying? Is "dressing to impress" more important than one's message?

I believe that corporations' are obsessed with having their bidders control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees.

Please. Corporations have legitimate and bona fide reasons to lobby their governments.

Of course they do. But I was responding to your suggestion that I am "obsessed" with corporations. The workings of corporations and corporate controlled government are too important for a mere "taxpayer" like Ziggy to be unconcerned about.

Just as you do. Just as any citizens do. You say "collectives". That is a curious choice of words. Not wrong. Just curious. Corporations are associations of individuals.

Stockholders engage in "collective bargaining" with employee unions, with customers, with suppliers, with government at virtually every level, etc. via the corporate structure- thus the word collective.

Are union lobbyists all as exemplary and selfless as corporate lobbyists are avaricious and self-serving?

If you are trying to put words in my mouth, I ask you to not do that. That is not what I said, nor what I meant.

I suspect that if I were a democrat I'd see nothing wrong with unions spending millions to elect democrats who are expected to capitulate to the union's demands.

Corporate PACS and corporate executives historically, and now corporations directly, spend many times more $$$$$ on political campaigns than do unions. And governments in the U.S. overall, whether Democratic or Republican controlled, bow to corporate likes and dislikes of public policies far more than they do to any and all other lobbying groups combined.

I don't have a problem with private-sector unions putting a brake on corporations.

Thank you for making that clear. I think that we both sometimes mistakenly read things into the other's words that were not there or not intended.

That is not what happens with public-sector unions. They make their demands on the public.

And are corporations not a part of "the public"- the taxpaying public? Earlier in the week you and Aaron seemed to be suggesting that they are not- that corporations had no stake nor interest in the happenings in Wisconsin. Did I misunderstand?

Wisconsin does not seek to curb the public-sector unions' ability to bargain collectively for wages (although I'd like to see that curbed, too). They seek to impose the members' increased contributions to their health care and to their pensions more in line with the contributions that Americans of every stripe make.

I am not as convinced of that as you seem to be. And apparently, neither is Governor Walker.

The hype and hyperbole are shrill and distracting. They do not add anything to the debate.

I agree. But we are all informed and misinformed based on what we have heard and read lately and in the light (or darkness) of what we have heard and read and believed over the course of our lives to date. None of us have perfectly informed psyches. Some of us are better than some others of us at figuring out what's really going on. Most of us do the best we can with what we have at any point in time.

But this: "...control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees..." bothers me immensely. I belonged to a corporate PAC. We never discussed any public employees at all. Nor did we seek to control all of government either virtually or in practical effect. We did have grievances which we sought to redress.

And do you not believe that those corporate "greviances" iin many instances include disallowing or doing away with collective bargaining by public employee unions? Or is that an agenda only of non-corporate "taxpayers"?

ohio county wrote:Finally, and at long last, what does the dust-up in Wisconsin have to do with corporations?

Governor Walker insists that "taxpayers" cannot afford the wages/salaries/benefits that public employer agencies have negotiated with their unions. Are corporations not among those taxpayers? Are corporate executives and corporate PACS not some of the biggest funders of Republican political campaigns in Wisconsin? I think it would be naive to believe that corporations do not have big direct stakes in what is happening in Wisconsin- and in a larger sense in what happens there might forecast for both public and private employee labor unions all over this country.

Or again, are corporations not among the "taxpayers" that Governor Walker and the Wisconsin Senate Republicans say they are representing and protecting?

Why should taxpayers be forced to compensate public employees better than the private sector? Why should taxpayers be forced to compensate public employees more than they can afford?

Should Governor Walker raise taxes to pay for the wages/salaries/benefits of public employees even if it means the corporations pull up stakes and leave Wisconsin for pastures with lower taxes?

Stephanie wrote:Why should taxpayers be forced to compensate public employees better than the private sector?

I am not saying that they should.

Why should taxpayers be forced to compensate public employees more than they can afford?

By taxpayers do you mean to include or exclude corporate taxpayers? Either way, the answer is no, I don't. But there is a pervasive implication here that somehow there is nothing at stake for corporations here (in the Wisconsin affair)- that corporations are or should be somehow exempt from "taxpayer" status.

Stephanie wrote:Should Governor Walker raise taxes to pay for the wages/salaries/benefits of public employees even if it means the corporations pull up stakes and leave Wisconsin for pastures with lower taxes?

Does this question mean that corporations do indeed have something at stake and are a part of what is hapopening in Wisconsin?

Just answer the question. You answer me, then I'll answer you.

Stephanie wrote:Just answer the question. You answer me, then I'll answer you.

I asked you first. I ask more questions than anyone else on this forum. And I get fewer answers to them than anyone else. So the pretense by some of you that I am the forum champion question dodger is unfounded.

Unless corporations are "taxpayers" and stakeholders in the happenings of recent in Wisconsin, then your question is irrelevant.

Should Governor Walker raise taxes to pay for the wages/salaries/benefits of public employees even if it means the corporations pull up stakes and leave Wisconsin for pastures with lower taxes?

That depends on if the corporations are good corporate citizens. If- like so many WV coal companies- a corporation or an industry is already costing the taxpayers more than it contributes in taxes and/or other benefits to the economy, then I say yeah, if it is an economic leach, tax it to some more equitable level. And if that causes it to leave for "pastures with lower taxes", then good riddance.

West Virginia would be far better off today if the leacherous coal industry had been forced to either reform or close shop 100 years ago.

On the other hand, if corporations are environmentally toilet trained, treats their employees fairly, pays a fair share of taxes already, and are not an environmental and economic leaches, then no, then should not be taxed to the point of oblivion.

Now again, does this question mean that corporations do indeed have something at stake and are a part of what is happening in Wisconsin?

I absolutely believe that corporations have something at stake in Wisconsin, just as they do anywhere they choose to operate. If Wisconsin places too many burdens on the corporations currently doing business within her borders, whether those burdens be of the tax variety or the regulatory variety or the cost of labor is exhorbitant, Wisconsin and her citizens shouldn't be at all surprised when their corporations move on to greener pastures.

Frank, you can't legislate morality. I realize you want all corporations to act in a manner you think is fair. Your idea of what's fair may not necessarily be my idea of fair, or the idea of what is fair to the executives of corporations operating in Wisconsin, or Wyoming, or West Virginia. Perhaps they don't even care what is fair.

The Governor of Wisconsin has made a decision. He has decided that balancing the budget without creating an inhospitable business climate is the best course of action for the future of his state and her people. I applaud his choice. I think it is wise because he could raise business taxes and he could raise taxes on the corporate executives making lucrative salaries and those corporate executives may just decide the cost of doing business in Wisconsin is too high so maybe they'll move to another state or worse yet, another country. All those jobs are lost and with it a whole lot of revenue and then who is going to pay all those public employees their generous salaries and amazing benefits?

Stephanie wrote:Frank, you can't legislate morality. I realize you want all corporations to act in a manner you think is fair. Your idea of what's fair may not necessarily be my idea of fair, or the idea of what is fair to the executives of corporations operating in Wisconsin, or Wyoming, or West Virginia. Perhaps they don't even care what is fair.

Well, if we believe OC and Sheik's assertion that corporations are "neither good nor evil"- that they are "amoral" and exist only to turn a profit for their stockholders, then why would we expect them to be fair? It's a screwed up world if people can divest themselves of the values of good and evil and to avoid moral responsibility by uniting in a government sanctioned legal contrivance we call a corporation.

In return for corporate charters from government, corporations should be required to maintain the level of regard for good and evil that we demand of individual people. Anything else is a corruption of principles of legal order and of moral responsibilities to the whole of society.

Now wait a minute, Ziggy. Now you're demanding the state require more from corporations than currently required from citizens.

My family currently resides in West Virginia. Although I have no children in public schools, and we receive no public assistance from the state of any kind other than a $375 WVHEA grant my daughter receives for college, I recognize that there are a few things the state of WV does provide. It isn't much mind you, and what there is I'm not all that satisfied with, but there is law enforcement and the judicial system and there are state roads that are plowed by the state and a couple of state parks that we visit regularly and a few others we have visited on occasion. There are probably other things but it's late and I'm tired.

We are not required to forever reside in West Virginia because for a time they provided these services for us in exchange for the taxes and fees we pay. Nor should we be. Why should corporations?

You want to talk about being good members of a community? How about all of those WV citizens who took advantage of WV public education and attend(ed) state colleges and universities subsidized by the taxpayers of WV and then rather than accept the wages paid in WV move to Maryland or Virginia or Pennsylvania or Ohio because they can make more money in those states? There are plenty of people who have or will receive degrees in teaching and nursing and medicine and pharmacy and a host of other professions that we need right here in this state but they leave WV for dust after receiving their cheap diploma courtesy of WV taxpayers.

If they don't have to stay and suffer under WV's deplorable business climate and judicial system, why should a corporation?

ziggy wrote:If- like so many WV coal companies- a corporation or an industry is already costing the taxpayers more than it contributes in taxes and/or other benefits to the economy, then I say yeah, if it is an economic leach, tax it to some more equitable level. And if that causes it to leave for "pastures with lower taxes", then good riddance.

West Virginia would be far better off today if the leacherous coal industry had been forced to either reform or close shop 100 years ago.

If you're basing that assumption on the study put out by Ted Boettner's Budget center, that information is at best misleading, more likey flat out wrong. Of the many problems the study has, the most glaring is that Teddy only credits 2 indirect jobs for every direct coal mining job. That is simply not correct. That number is closer to 7 jobs for every coal mining job meaning the tax revenue and other economic benefits the study claims is false.

Stephanie wrote:If they don't have to stay and suffer under WV's deplorable business climate and judicial system, why should a corporation?

Most corporations are here because something they need is here- coal, timber, gas, even some oil, a labor pool- the raw materials of enterprise. They can't just up and take the coal and the timber and the gas with them. The very act of harvesting those resources demands that it- harvesting of the natural resources- be done here, where the resource is, and not in Texas nor in India nor in Timbuktu.

If ABC timber or mining company leaves because it doesn't like our environmental rules and tax structure, then the resource is still here and XYZ timber/coal will harvest the same resource sooner or later. The notion that state government is powerless and must always be subserviant to the corporations is misguided. It ignores the reality that there is a world-wide demand for limited resources- and West Virginia is the home of a big pile of those resources. But at the rate we're going, in another 50 years or so the coal will be gone and the wealth the coal generated will be gone, and the land will be debauched. For the script we need look no further away than McDowell County WV. For 100 years McDowell County fed the nation's steel mills- at great human cost.

But today in a single square block of Pittsburgh PA there is more residual wealth generated by the coal taken in the 20th century from McDowell County WV than in all of West Virginia. Most of the coal had been taken from McDowell County by the time even one cent of severance tax had been levied on coal mined in West Virginia late in the 20th century. McDowell County would be better off today had the political pimps for the coal industry not occupied the WV statehouse for more than a hundred years.

ziggy wrote: I believe that corporations' are obsessed with having their bidders control virtually all of government- including the salaries, wages and other benefits of public employees. When I go to the WV state legislature on certain lobby says, I do not see your referenced blue-haired little old ladies wearing tennis shoes among the hordes of lobbyists. I see mostly male, "stripey suited" (to use a Shermanism) lobbyists identified by the registered lobbyists handbook and spending reports as representing and paid by- quess what- by corporations. By any reasonable measure, corporations are a major player in American economics and politics- including in Wisconsin.

So Mr. ZIGGY, please tell us all ........ what would be the end results suffered by corporations ....... iffen those "mostly male, "stripey suited" (to use a Shermanism) lobbyists identified by the registered lobbyists handbook and spending reports as representing and paid by- quess what- by corporations" ........ ceased to ply their trade in Legislative Offices, etc., all across the US?