A Shift of Mind

With all due respect, I cannot find much to agree with in all you wrote. Your words said or written a thousand different ways over the years always has the same core message: "the desire to be wealthy is bad". Your message is a universal Trojan Horse for those who believe and long for socialism. No matter how many times it has been tried and failed and losing many believers along the way, there are always an abundance of others to take their places. Greed (my definition being "lusting for or taking that belonging to others by force or other means") is bad. I think we both agree greed is one of mankind's "orignal sins". We just disagree on the definition.

Someone who works hard and attains wealth is not greedy. Someone who may be poor but does not work, often blaming others for their plight, IF they lust after the wealth produced by the "rich man" noted above but taking it by organized theft (government wealth redistribution by force - the I.R.S. is "force") is guilty of greed.

Was this man guilty of greed?; probably not. To those not wealthy by their own hard work jump to the conclusion that "the rich" (anyone with more assets than you have) are evil and greedy (for not "sharing" with them just "because"). If you look at the charitable giving of "the rich", you'll discover "the rich" in the most free and capitalistic countries give the most to help those who truly need help and, perhaps, suffer due to no fault of theirs. By contrast, "the rich" in socialist countries where "the rich" are most often those who have the best "connections" and are, in many ways, at the front of the line when government largess literally gives them money and other assets in return for their allegiance to those at the top of a supposedly "fair" society. Records show people who amass wealth and power amidst a socialist society give/share almost none of their ill gotten gains with the truly needy. THEY are the true definition of greedy.

Mr. Madaoff is guilty of succumbing to another flaw of mankind; the universal desire to be liked/loved by others; to be looked up to and to be envied as someone of great intelligence. While not such much with Mr. Madaoff it appears, often with this comes and insatiable desire for power. The age-old saying: Power Corrupts and Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely" is, perhaps, the root cause of most of man's troubles on this earth since we first walked upright. Yes, Mr. Madaoff did "live large" but also well below the huge wealth available to him. He lived at a level that would include him in the various "circles" of friends he sought love and approval from. If he had not run a Ponzi scheme and just stuck to where he started, he would have never been accepted into the circle of friends he wanted to be a member of and, in fact, a leader who others admire and look up to.

Just as in almost any embezzlement or "White Collar Theft" it rarely begins with the person intending to do anything more than take and spend money that is not theirs then use it to make money that would be theirs then replace the "borrowed" money. This goes on thousands of times a day with the person often being successful in their plan. They replace the money and maybe (maybe not) were successful in using the "borrowed" money to generate wealth of their own.

But, all too often, their "scheme" fails causing them to borrow more and more until they have a true Ponzi scheme having never intended to do anything dishonest. EVERY recession shakes out dozens of such schemes as "new money" to replace "old money" dries up and, what is now a crime comes to light. While Mr. Madaoff Ponzi scheme is the largest of this recession, if you read the news looking for other such schemes, you will find dozens have been uncovered. Virtually none of the (soon to be) convicted felons think of themselves as anything other than honest and ethical. They (usually) do not worry about the impending loss of their wealth that they know is not theirs but the loss of the love, respect and admiration of those they sought this from.

Whether you recognize it for what it is, your "Trojam Horse" message said and written a thousand times before would vastly INCREASE the number of such crimes if becoming wealthy by hard work, intelligence and, yes, sometimes sheer luck by changing society to that of socialism or even communism brings forth the true greed we both agree is bad.

No matter how much "the rich" are hated and vilified those who attained their wealth by their own (legal) means, no way has ever been found to have a society with many "middle-class" people enjoying life without enough of "the rich" who generated the jobs and opportunities for millions of others and, more importantly a society that gives hope to millions that they too may someday join "the rich". Substitute "the rich" with "big, all encompassing government" whose purpose is to redistribute the wealth of a society soon finds the golden eggs have disappeared with the killing of the golden goose.

Written so many times before in so many different ways your article was nothing but yet another attempt to vilify "the rich" and glorify the perfect society we would have if wealth was distributed fairly.

No, Mr. Madaoff was not guilty of greed. He was guilty of desiring love, respect and admiration of individuals he would have never attained if he had not resorted to his trickery. Included were those at the highest echelons of government "watchdogs" who are supposed to catch such nefarious activity and do so early. Mr. Madaoff managed to put himself above all of that. Those who head the SEC, for instance, have said "it would be like we were auditing God so we did nothing". No amount of new laws would have stopped this from happening. There were plenty of laws already. They just were not enforced. Now, because of Mr. Madaoff, many of the often hated "rich" are sudden members of "the poor". Should we now all love them?

Yes, I know. Socialism is coming to our country and coming soon. Everyone, except the new elite, will be equal - equally poor. Based on the results of the past, that seems to be the objective of socialism - uiversal poverty with a select few wielding unchecked power as they so wish. If that is not the purpose of socialism then something is wrong as that has ALWAYS been the end result.

Perhaps I should have been clearer in this post. I do not equate wealth with greed. The philanthropic work of the likes of Warren Buffet and Bill Gates, and nameless and countless others are humane and benevolent. In such circumstances the attainment of their wealth has a beneficial ripple effect.

Greed, as commonly defined is an excessive or rapacious desire for wealth--- Often, at the expense of others.I find this to be an inhumane and destructive force, with profound implications. Wealth isn't the issue, the relentless and selfish drive which at times accompany it, is.

As for socialism, we have long been a country familiar with socialism. Our educational system, our postal service, our fire and police departments and the very foundation of most of our communities are socialist in nature. We really need to become sensitive to how words trigger us. My post didn't attack capitalism, simply greed and runaway consumerism.Throwing such labels at one another resembles the nonsense of the political season

Most certainly an addiction, I believe as well, regarding greed. In fact, it has become a societal norm here. We are engaged in massive groupthink in order to do what we were meant to do, which apparently is to financially prosper.

Yet I would also label addictive greed as a subculture of psychopaths.