NYTimes: The Real Crime Is What’s Not Done

This article makes the case that better regulation is far more effective than criminal prosecution for corporate misdeeds.

A well-enforced regulatory regime lacks the TV-movie narrative arc of a criminal trial. But none of these crimes could have been committed if the government had been doing its job properly.

With regulatory structures in willful disrepair, the corporate world has become one more sphere colonized by the police and prosecutors. But even as progressives have begun to question the overuse of criminal law elsewhere, its encroachments into the white-collar world are generally cheered: Finally, a chance to stick it to “crime in the suites”!
Criminal law, however, turns out to be a lot better at catching the small, sad fish of middle management than the sharks of industry and finance. Go to the F.B.I.’s “most wanted” webpage for white-collar crime and what leaps out is how many on the list are nonwhite and how petty their swindles are.
The injustice of the Flint contamination and other safety disasters demand a meaningful response. Criminal law is not the right tool for the job.

The Real Crime Is What’s Not Done http://nyti.ms/2bF6sum

The Bloodthirsty America

Our mission from General McChrystal.

We Americans are not a uniquely bloodthirsty people. We do not have more violent video games or movies than other countries. We do not have more dangerously mentally ill individuals than other countries. We are not unique in facing down the threat of global terrorism and active shooters.

But we have uniquely high rates of gun deaths and injuries that make us stand out in the worst of ways. Our communities should not feel like war zones. Our leaders can start by doing more to keep guns out of the hands of those who cannot be trusted to handle them responsibly. That must be our mission.

Home Should Not Be a War Zone http://nyti.ms/1YvInGU

NYTimes: Moving to Arizona Soon? You Might Need a License

We can’t agree to a fiduciary standard to regulate financial advisors and to require that they act in their clients best interest.

But…

In Tennessee, a license is required to shampoo hair; in Florida, to sell a yacht. In Montana, you need the state’s approval to be an egg candler; in Utah, to repair upholstery; in Louisiana, to be a florist.

Moving to Arizona Soon? You Might Need a License http://nyti.ms/28L3D0b

Indian Drugs and the Need for Regulation

“Oh we don’t need regulation! We don’t need Big Government watching out for us. The Free Market is all we need, its self regulating.”

Businesses here and abroad simply can’t be trusted to do the right thing. Now, in the past, or ever. Sure our government has its problems and corruptions, but its all we’ve got. Leave industry and the ‘Free Market’ to itself and we’ll shortly be living in a very toxic polluted posionous world.

[India is,] coming under increased scrutiny by American regulators for safety lapses,falsified drug test results and selling fake medicines.

India’s pharmaceutical industry supplies 40 percent of over-the-counter and generic prescription drugs consumed in the United States

The World Health Organization estimated that one in five drugs made in India are fakes. A 2010 survey of Delhi pharmacies found that 12 percent of sampled drugs were spurious.

One widely used antibiotic [in India] was found to contain no active ingredient after being randomly tested in a government lab. The test was kept secret for nearly a year while some 100,000 useless pills continued to be dispensed.

Its even worse in China. They won’t let us in to regulate them.

http://nyti.ms/1fnB61R