Isn't this a perfect example of why some things need to be done by government, not for-profit industry?

Lately, there has been a rush in Red states, cities and counties to “save money” by privatizing the prison industry. A Pennsylvania Judge just got 28 years in prison and a $1.2 million fine for a ’‘kids for cash’’ scheme where for-profit prisons paid him by the head and who cared whether the kids were innocent or guilty.

Corporations are not inherently evil, nor are they inherently good. They are amoral. They run by one simple rule—maximize profits. Any top executive who fails to maximize profits is fired, and replaced by one who will.

How does a for-profit prison maximize profits when they only make so much per body housed? Marketing. Make more things crimes. Bribe judges to throw the book at people, innocent or not. Lobby lawmakers to criminalize more and more things. Follow China’s lead. Make political activity a crime. Sell body parts taken by force from “criminals” who happen to sympathize with the party that’s not currently in power. Jailing the opposition party helps vastly in reelection as well.

How about privatizing police and fire protection? Got an emergency? Well, depending on how serious it is, they’ll decide how much helping you is going to cost you. A simple situation might just be $50 but something life threatening would run you $10,000 cash. Pay in advance or no help. House on fire? Gee, the place is worth $350,000. You want it saved? It’s going to cost you half of that. Pay up or burn up. It’s your choice.

How about we privatize the military and let Erik Prince of Blackwater “protect” the USA. Think how much we could save. Think what he might do to maximize profit when he had all the firepower needed to take anything he wanted.

How did we ever get to such inanity as for-profit prisons and privatized education? How long after we privatize public education with a voucher system before elite schools emerge that only the rich can afford, and the vast majority of the public can only get the most rudimentary education suitable to prepare them for a life of indentured servitude?

Deregulate all business and corporations will save us from the evils of government? How can we think that the two massive savings and loan bailouts of the 1980s never happened? How can we think that Michael Milliken never went to prison for his junk bond scams? Did Enron never run a shell-game scam? Was Countrywide not actually run as an investment Ponzi scheme? Were Adelphia, WorldCom, and Bernie Madoff, all just lies made up by the liberal mainstream media? Halliburton didn’t squander billions on no bid contracts and build such shoddy facilities in Iraq that US soldiers were electrocuted while trying to take a shower?

And the robber barons and vast trusts of the late 1800s never happened—or corporate leaders wouldn’t do that again if laws preventing it are removed? Oh, and there was never a financial crisis of 2007 where deliberately shaky home loans were repacked ed into 130 trillion worth of derivatives that were created by, insured by and rated AAA by the same banksters to transfer trillions out of the US economy and into the hands of a select few who never even got charged with a crime?

How much reality does it take to break through right-wing ideology? Is it even possible?