NYT: "Vandals Hit Home of Ex-Chief of Bank."

[bushmeister0]

"LONDON: The house of Fred Goodwin, the former chief executive of the ailing Royal Bank of Scotland, was vandalized early Wednesday and windows of his car were smashed.

Mr. Goodwin attracted criticism for keeping his £703,000, or $1 million, pension despite a string of ill-timed acquisitions under his tenure that brought the bank under government control and calls from Prime Minister Gordon Brown to surrender the payment.

At least three windows on the ground-floor level of his house in an affluent suburb of Edinburgh, Scotland, were smashed and a black Mercedes S600 parked in the driveway was vandalized."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/26/business/worldbusiness/26rbs.html?em

Gosh, that's a real shame, isn't it? Perhaps this might help to focus minds of Goodwin's partners in crime here in the US?

From the last paragraph of the article:

"Death threats and outrage aimed at recipients of $165 million in bonuses at the insurance giant American International Insurance in the United States was cited as one reason officials eventually decided not to release the names of the employees who received the money."

I should think naming these people might more easily assure they give the money back, and quickly. It's our money they're getting, why shouldn't we have a right to know who they are? So what if their Mercedes' get their window's broken?

Tough shit. You do the crime, you lose your windows.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. I don't support vigilantism. I don't care if it's a misplaced vendetta

against the embodiment of Ebeneezer Scrooge.

[Oregone]

2. As much disdain as I can have for the mob at times,

The threat of a mob is required to maintain systematic balance and have capitalism benefit both the owners and the ownerless. So, you know, in times like this I just have to sit it out confused. There are reasons things like this happen, and benefits to the happening, yet as a whole, it is bad the world is at such a point where they will happen more abundantly. I would doubt the vandals were driven by some deeper conviction or did this while reciting sections of Marx verbatim. Yet, perhaps without knowledge and a deep sense of ideals, they performed a more valuable service for all of society than other men who get millions in compensation a year.

[leftstreet]

4. A thoughtful post

...for those of us also sitting it out confused, or ambivalent, when hearing these stories.

:thumbsup:

[bushmeister0]

3. I don't support vigilantism, either, I'm just saying people get their windows

broken all the time, for much less reason.

Naming names, though, would shame these people into doing the right thing. Making them think that perhaps their property or their physical person might be in danger is better than just letting them get away with laughing all the way to the bank in anonymity. At the very least, if they thought there was some crazy out there after them, a large portion of their ill-gotten gains would be wasted on private security.

[diamidue]

5. Well, it opens up employment opportunities

for all those returning soldiers in Britain and the USA. The rich are going to be needing body guards/security guards if class warfare erupts...

I wonder if it isn't talk radio in the London that is encouraging this type of behavior.

[Regret My New Name]

6. Indifferent.

I wouldn't break someones window myself and wouldn't encourage anyone to do it either, but I have a hard time caring about assholes. I wonder if that makes me an asshole.