Seeing Red not Green: Joan Vennochi wrote a great article in the Boston Sunday Globe entitled "Evergreen's declawed clawback" (link below) which talked about a governor that lied about how much an energy saving company Evergreen was given in loans by the state and how much it paid back. Then to make me see red it shipped (with our taxpayer dollars) their entire business to guess where? China, of course! I wrote an opinion to the Globe and Joan Vennochi:
Ms. Vennochi I am an ardent Democrat but your Boston Sunday Globe January 23, 2011 op ed "Evergreen's declawed clawback" shows to me over and over again how even a Democrat running on a platform for honest change can be anything but honest. These unconscionable immoral porcine feeding at the taxpayer trough are SO in bed with business that even elected officials who purportedly are part of the humanitarian change for which we on the left are yearning are swept into the vortex of pay to play politics. Moving from corrupt, dirty, depleted oil to environmentally safe fuels is what we want but we want that because it will bring jobs and business back to this country NOT take it out. What happens? We the taxpayer of Massachusetts give this unethical company 60 million and not only does a Democratic governor who ran as a left of center candidate, lie about the amount the company was given and owes, that vile company ships the WHOLE enchilada to China a country which has us over the barrel (so to speak) like a mafia loan shark would hold a borrower over the barrel of a gun. The guilt then is at not only the state level but the federal level too by its lack of significant change in tariff and trade policy.
It is, yet again, the middle class taxpayer who is deep sixed. This is UNCONSCIONABLE "Evergreen" should have been forced to sign a contract that said if they move ANYTHING abroad without paying the money back to the state they will be forced to pay fines in triplicate and maybe even suffer criminal prosecution of its CEO's as well who continually thumb their noses at those who loaned them big money. This should include the ability of the state legally to go after these corporate thieves abroad. If they do not sign an agreement to pay the loan back and keep jobs in this country than the loan should never be made. They have a STRONG ETHICAL duty to this since the state and the country give them their opportunity for great wealth. It is MY money and it is YOUR money. It's every citizen's money but we reap little. We, the middle class, are the ones who can least afford it and are held economically hostage to inherently corrupt people and policy.
Republicans are guilty of this ten fold but Democrats are as well and what you wrote surely shows that. This is why the Tea Party formed BUT they are misguided. If they think the unbridled free market is about them they are sorely mistaken. Greed knows NO morality and when government, the people's ONLY recourse, knows no morality and is in bed with business then I do not know what what the answer is. Yes, strict oversight, perhaps, BUT they cannot put the same foxes in charge of the chickens the foxes are killing and further our elected officials who do not meet their ethical responsibility should face censure as well.
The real answer is a Nader-like grass roots movement that brings honesty, transparency and ethics to those we put in positions of great power.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2011/01/23/evergreens_declawed_clawback/
