Self-interest.

Editor,

Some posters have expressed the need for laws to prevent this sort of thing from happening, and laws to that effect are probably a good idea. But this article illuminates the extent of the immorality -- the utter contempt for morality -- that has swept through the American financial "industry" over the last 30 years.

You can't legislate a sense of belonging to the human race, but you sure can convince people by repeating again and again and again that, as Margaret Thatcher so eloquently said: "There is no such thing as society. Only individual men and women looking out for their own self interest."

It isn't hard to trace the history of American business transforming itself from providing something of value into devising ways to plunder, but it will be a daunting job to brainwash away the "self-interest" shibboleth that got us here, if doing so is possible at all.

re: "Profits for Buyout Firms as Company Debt Soared" (10/5/2009)