Temple Of Greed

You should read this post after reading the previous post. Sorry.

The idol worshippers at the Pagan Temple of Greed. Another way to say GOP.

The term, "Invisible Hand," comes from dear old Adam Smith, the great, great, grandfather of market economics. A believer in many ways of fundamentalism. Seldom is fundamentalism good.

In my opinion, the very devout Adam Smith expected his God to distribute food, water, and vital material wealth. If man would just let his God do his work.

Few of us could agree with God creating millionaires after hearing the Beatitudes read for Paul Edd McClendon yesterday.

Jesus was no blood stained and battle weary warrior. And, certainly not a millionaire.

But, what do 'our millionaires' want today?

Since I have refused the 'job' of millionaire, pun intended, I don't really know.

But, here is a story about one of the largest companies in the world and what the millionaires want from them.

A big hint? The millionaires don't want more employees or bigger profits. They want bigger stock prices at any cost.

Story

EVEN by the standards of a company that builds everything from light bulbs to power plants and straddles markets as varied as prime-time TV and commercial finance, General Electric’s mammoth project along the Hudson River north of Albany is staggering. The company plans to lay down more than 28,000 feet of rail and 267,000 square yards of plastic beside the river’s edge — all to haul nearly 400,000 tons of sediment from the bottom of the Hudson beginning in 2009, seven years and $500 million after G.E. agreed to undertake the job.

Except this isn’t one of the huge infrastructure projects that’s driving G.E.’s bottom line these days; it’s a government-mandated cleanup of pollutants the company dumped in the river long ago. It’s also a task that G.E. routinely resisted for decades until Jeffrey R. Immelt, then the rookie chief executive, succumbed to federal pressure and abandoned the combative stance of his predecessor, John F. Welch Jr., and pledged to dredge the Hudson.

The clock is ticking. There is growing pressure on Mr. Immelt to do something — anything — to get G.E.’s stock moving after six years of stagnation. Despite a 15 percent rally over the last two months, G.E. shares are still down 30 percent from their Welch-era peak. And in April, the analyst Jeffrey T. Sprague of Citigroup Investment Research stunned Wall Street by calling for a breakup of the company, urging Mr. Immelt to sell off NBC Universal, as well as the consumer finance and real estate units.

Do ... anything ... to raise the value of the stock. Stock prices have nothing to do with the present value of the company. It's more like a bunch of kids, in $1,000 suits, deciding which baseball card is worth the most. Only these kids aren't trading candy, marbles, and toys.

The only measure of a company for the 'market' is the price of the stock.

Ouch.

P.S. My apology to Paul's family for using their loss to make a point about devout pagans.