I am, at the same time, deeply saddened and deeply angered by the degree of fraud and corruption that has come to characterize our society. From my early adulthood in the mid 1950s through 1990 I never encountered a single instance of telephone or fraud, or of people attempting to gouge for services. Ever since the Reagan era focus on deregulation, however, the picture has turned much darker. The culture of rampant greed has been freed and emboldened to try to profit by using and abusing others. Even through the mid to late 1990s, the only such fraud attempts I encountered were rare calls from fraudulent charities.
With Republican administrations continuing to slash protective regulations at both state and federal levels, I get up to 10 calls a day claiming to be from the IRS, Microsoft, credit card companies, phony charities, phony political organizations -- even a call purporting to be from my grandson in jaul and needing money for bail. I even encountered one building contractor who wanted to charge me over 4 times reasonable cost for a job ( and wo pressured me to sign a contract immediately for a 10 percent discount. Internet fraud attempts are just as frequent.
Something is deeply wrong with a society that is constantly try to scam or cheat others . And, something is just as wrong with a society that is letting it happen to them. And. something is deeply wrong with a culture of greed and its enablers -- the Republican Party --actively attempting to dismantle protections and refusing to create needed new ones
It's all the fault of "deregulation." Those regulations were what protected us and the environment from corporate avarice.
I think there's no pretense anymore with free market capitalism. It's survival of the fittest totally stripped of the laws and morality that restricted excess. Sadly, I think it's what our parents wanted and also what we wanted, as we all joined in to gradually lower the bar and promote the focus on the individual.
I’ve begun to envision ‘life in america’ resembling the ol’ TV Westerns … where everybody’s wearing a gun, women are either damsels in distress or ‘bar girls.’ Frontier Justice & survival of the cruelest... Where religion reigns ..and seldom is heard a discouraging word (from the media)
Your last sentence is key, “-- the Republican Party --actively attempting to dismantle protections and refusing to create needed new ones.” My guess is at one time ‘those scammers’ cobbled together a ‘PAC’ (political action committee) that allowed them to anonymously funnel money into the Republican Party … thus it’s been ‘hands off’ ever since..
The only thing Bush Jr ‘did for the nation’ was institute the National No Call List. Do you use it? I have, and keep my immediate family's numbers updated as well. Every time I get a scam attempt - I go online and report ‘them.’ I get very few such calls..
@PalacinkyPDX I report them all.. Sometimes I’ll search them, almost always coming up with multiple hits of the same number pestering others … leaving me to wonder why something hasn’t been done? After I report them to the No Call Registry Complaint page (or whatever it’s called), I rarely if ever get a call from the same number..
I’d always wondered why Bush Jr cared, seemed so out of character to do something for the consumer … other than his aging parents may have complained
The rulers are swine at troughs. Entrenched, immovable. But the rest of our problems is a mixture of events. 1. Overpopulation. The very few jobs that will be chased by many will fuel corruption, i.e criminality like nothing we have seen so far. The human species is following dinosaurs which are good for the planet. Our children will hate us, soon and for a good reason.2. Capitalism clearly shows that it is hard to live in the world and harder if you are stupid. I saw guys paying 10% week after week for cashing a paycheck because no bank would let him open an account. The corporation is owned by people. I remember being paid year after year partly in shares. Where are they??? This is the stupidity I am talking about. The purpose of the corporation is to make money for its owners. To make money means to take away from stupid. Sometimes the corporation provides value for our money, sometimes just hot air. We can support them or not. Our free choice, I have no problem with it. 3. Advertising is different. It is very the same as being raped. And now the same bastards ask for money in order not to send their BS to you. I tried to develop and market a gadget that would change the picture on TV as soon as the ad starts with a picture of fish in the tropical sea. I asked in China, no luck. This gadget would buy me a coffin made of platinum and I would buy the rocks from the tiara of the British queen to decorate the top. 4. The cockroach group (politician, lawyer, clergy and the banker) created a nifty system for themselves that all of us pay. The roach is responsible for the cost of drugs is so high. I know what a disgusting group this is. My uncle was a roach, but he was an honest one. Instead of saving criminals from the electric chair he worked for an insurance company making sure that you pay maximum the traffic will bear and is there is a loss you collect preferably nothing. Not as damaging as recycling criminals and charging good rate from the wronged for the criminal's defense. We could go on and on, Lobbyists. Another group that should not get out of bed for shame.
@PalacinkyPDX I've had several using numbers of deceased people. Amazing. The number is local as well.
Capitalism at its finest.
As long as we continue to annihilate our environment we are in fact condoning fraud.
That is unbridled Capitalism, my friend; there is only one direction for it to go-toward the money. Humans are drawn to it; money and power, and when the methods of acquisition are left unfettered, well, here we are. Not sure what the remedy is; personally, I think the Scandinavian countries are onto something. But, yeah, we have to find a way to get these resource rapists out.