Kimberly Strassel has a tremendously important column in today’s Wall Street Journal. It’s entitled “Pfizer’s Bad Political Bet” and focuses on the highly political CEO of the company, Jeffrey Kindler, who saw the chance for great profits in Obama’s intent to federalize health care and doled out lots of money to elect Democrats and then push the agenda. Oops.
She concludes, “Kindler might take solace that he’s not alone. Insurers, hospitals, utilities — many chose to accommodate a president whose health-care and climate agendas are now comatose. There’s a lesson here for corporate America. Try standing up for the free markets and limited government that have always been the foundation of U.S. business. It might work out better.”
And since I’m in a mood to pile on, I’ll mention that Pfizer’s big development in New London, CT — the one calling for the use of eminent domain to seize lots of land from homeowners and force them out — has been abandoned.
The essential problem is that when government has almost boundless powers, unscrupulous business people will be unable to resist the lure of easy profits through the manipulation of government officials. The only solution is to remove the temptation by returning government to a purely defensive, order-keeping role.
