These "hairy issues" are just symptoms.
1. Blaming regulators doesn't make sense. Greed and extreme self-interest are at the heart of people's problems in general, and the causes of many of the decisions resulting in our current position. Witness the power usurped from the Senate and Judiciary by the Executive branch over the past fifty years. Those same people hobbled regulators and imposed their wills to weaken the regulatory structure and further empower themselves.
2. The fact that money speaks louder than bullets in Washington is one avenue through which those self-interests are articulated. Part of this problem is the aggressive nature of the lobby industry; a key complement to it is the non-transparent environment in which lobbying must take place to be effective. If our representation is to be responsive to all constituents it cannot be for sale or otherwise influenced by financial strength alone.
3. That a corporation is afforded the rights of a human being is wrong. It has no conscience or purpose, other than to generate a profit at any cost, sometimes with catastrophically dangerous outcomes (thalidomide, tobacco, Ford Pinto...) A corporation's person status enables self-interested people to further reach for power by allowing them to do things through the corporation that would be unconscionable by an individual and/or illegal, and to only pay penalties when caught. When personal responsibility exits, a sociopath remains. This cannot be fixed with legislation; Sarbanes-Oxley's only good when it's enforceable.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
