The “AIG thing” bores me

March 19, 7:20 PMDC Corporate Ethics ExaminerJim Cunningham

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I haven’t really covered the AIG thing. Barrels of ink are already being wasted – yes wasted – elsewhere on the whole mess. I generally prefer to dig a little deeper than the prevailing headline thoughout the land for more interesting tidbits like how I covered how renters are being screwed on the same day the rest of the media would only talk about AIG.

Still, people keep asking me what I think about “this whole AIG thing", hoping I have some unique perspective as the Corporate Ethics Examiner. I do, but my reply always disappoints them.

Please allow me to disappoint you as well.

AIG just happens to be on the radar right now. It’s all the rave right now to rant about corporate greed. (I was doing it long before it was cool.) The media is covering this “AIG thing” to the omission of all other stories. AIG execs are the latest media darlings just like Britney, OJ Simpson and Michael Jackson have been before in other overly-obsessed news cycles.

The truth of the matter is that this kind of greed, as well as many kinds that are worse, are going on beneath the radar every day - have been going on for a long time, yet it’s received tacit acceptance by the general public, and by our politicians who preferred (until just recently) to look the other way, either because they were benefiting from their political contributions or because it was just easier to ignore it than to fight corporate interests.

In a week, a month or by mid-summer this will all be long forgotten and corporate greed will thrive once again at the expense of the general public and every other living being while everyone who is outraged now go back to whatever they were doing and the news media find something new to get excited about.

Do you really want to know what I think about this “whole AIG thing”? I think if you just now started paying attention, then you’re part of the problem.