Tag: neofeudalism

  How much is a life worth? How much would it cost you to run over someone with a car and leave them for dead?

 It’s not a question you will ever have to answer, unless you are very wealthy.

 Martin Joel Erzinger, who manages more than $1 billion in assets for Morgan Stanley in Denver, is being accused only of a misdemeanor for allegedly driving his Mercedes into a cyclist and then fleeing the scene, Colorado’s Vail Daily reports. The victim, Dr. Steven Milo, whom Erzinger allegedly hit in July, suffered spinal cord injuries, bleeding from his brain and, according to his lawyer Harold Haddon, “lifetime pain.”

  But District Attorney Mark Hurlbert says it wouldn’t be wise to prosecute Erzinger — doing so might hurt his source of income.

 Lord knows we don’t want to endanger the critical job of managing wealth for the uber-wealthy.

  The financial crisis that grips our nation’s states and cities has a malicious source, and Governor Tim Pawlenty recently named that source: public school teachers.

 “It used to be that public employees were underpaid and over-benefited. Now they are over-benefited and overpaid compared to their private-sector counterparts.”

 The school teacher, the policeman, the firefighter – these are now the faces of what is wrong with America today. It doesn’t matter that studies by the Bureau of Labor Statistics say otherwise, America can no longer afford their overpaid, middle-class salaries.

  At least that is what the right-wing media is telling us. Tea party members also want to see a drastic pay cut for the same people who teach their children. A familiar comment on the internet is, “I took a pay cut last year. Why shouldn’t they?”

  This attitude goes beyond schadenfreude and goes straight to the crabs in a bucket mentality. Strangely enough this attitude of “if I can’t have it, neither should you” only extends to working class people who live next door. For some reason none of the jealousy and malice is reserved for the people who actually broke the budgets of the states and cities, i.e. the people who deserve it.