Public Flogging

I can't argue with this point made by Eugene Robinson. It is so obvious.

I can't argue with the administration's decision to force GM chief executive Rick Wagoner to resign. It was encouraging, even, to see the White House employ that kind of muscle, given the fact that the president now has to oversee so much of the economy. But shouldn't the first public flogging have involved one of the bankers who got us into this predicament? On Friday, the day when Wagoner got his walking papers, the biggest cheeses on Wall Street went to the White House for a cordial meeting. All still had their jobs when they left.

And why does it seem like something a Republican would do? This Democratic coddling of the banking/financial sector is sickening to me. Maybe that comes from my blue-collar background, with my dad and my brother having worked on the shop floor their whole lives manufacturing not cars but locomotives. I admire their work and think it is worthy of respect. They got up everyday at 6 or 7, worked their eight hours and sometimes overtime, just to have a decent life. We had our small pleasures, like a little wooden boat to go fishing in.

Now the bankers, well, they worked their hours, and had a very good life, with country club memberships and boats, er, I mean yachts. Okay, I accept that. The way of the world and all. But when it comes to equal treatment for having screwed up royally, please don't tell me that we need to go easy on the bankers. That is unacceptable.