Victims of Greed

Thousands of lives were lost in the WTC tragedy, thousands more ruined. People everywhere came to the aid of the victims. Citizens of the US felt their country attacked and wanted to defend it.

Rallying to the aid of the victims of corporate greed is a little more difficult. To admit evil here, one has to look within. There are no national boundaries. The old flag waving won't help here. Corporate greed is pervasive and affects us all. And it's not a national thing, so nationalism can't be used to mobilise the forces of good.

Helping the victims of the Enron, Global Crossing, WorldCom and other disasters is not national. It's bigger than that - as big as it gets. It's about good against evil, about the elite against the little guy.

It's about tens of thousands of employees who have seen their life savings wiped out. It's about pensioners who today have nothing to stay retired on. It's about how a small gang of super egotrippers knowingly took money from these people to save their exaggerated lifestyle. It's about being able to put food on the table tomorrow evening, to keep up the mortgage payments, to let the kids stay in college, and to be able to sleep at night without the fear of dissolution plaguing one's dreams and turning them into unutterable nightmares.

The legally protected estate of WorldCom CFO Scott Sullivan in sunny Florida.

People in the US do not have an adequate social welfare system. They have to live on the edge all the time. They have to put money away for rainy days like people nowhere else in the Western world. They have to live in fear.

It's not important if the legal eagles managing the countless class action cases now pending can emerge victorious farther down the line. What's important is that their clients - the victims of greed - get comfort and relief now.

We at Radsoft have corresponded with many of these law firms, and the cooperation and response has been lukewarm. We've received suggestions to turn over donations directly to them. But I don't feel this is a very good idea. The law firms will stick their thumbs in the pies before their clients do. The law firms do not need any financial support from the public at large - their clients do.

If you represent an interest group that has been victimised by the likes of Ken Lay, Gary Winnick, or Bernie Ebbers, write to vog@radsoft.net and tell us who you are. If you would like to help the victims of greed with a donation, write to vog@radsoft.net. Radsoft will do their best to put you in touch with one another.

John Steinbeck said that the forces of good must always win out over the forces of evil because the human race will not accept less. Emerging victorious over these acts of corporate greed is not a question of seeing which politician can blow the most hot air, or which news agency can write the most damning essays, and it is not a question of chasing the bad guys and slapping them on the wrists. The fate of the forces of good has little to do with these people anyway. Winning is essential, but the only way to win is by ignoring the bad guys and sticking together and not letting them win - not letting them destroy lives - and showing the world, once and for all, that they cannot win ever again.

The world we live in today is far different from the world Global Crossing and WorldCom started in only a few years ago. Today people can waste money bidding on junk at eBay and buy books and CDs and DvDs by the tons at Amazon and Barnes & Noble - and if everyone who gave one dollar to the victims of the WTC tragedy could give another dollar today, then the victims of greed would be safer tonight.

Rick