By Jim Hightower
Sometimes,
a news story can be so crammed with irony that it boggles the mind. Consider
just the headline on one such story that ran recently in my town’s daily paper:
“Man gets 10 years for defrauding banks.”
That
just screams for a rewrite, doesn’t it? I yearn for a story with a headline in
boldface type that, at long last, would trumpet this joyous news: “Banker get
10 years for defrauding man.”
Alas,
while the FBI, IRS, and the judicial establishment went all out to nail the
bank defrauder, they allow big-time Wall Street crooks who defraud us to escape
prosecution, much less jail.
The
latest Wall Street tycoon to admit to grand scale larceny, yet pay no personal
penalty, is Jamie Dimon, the head honcho of JPMorgan Chase. Shareholders in
Dimon’s felonious operation have been socked with a record $13 billion in
penalties, but not a penny comes from Jamie’s pocket.
Still,
popping the bank for 13 big ones shows that the Justice Department is finally
getting tough on corporate crime, right? Not exactly.
JPMorgan’s
punishment will be softened significantly by this unannounced outrage: A corporation
— unlike a person — can deduct criminal fines from its income taxes. That means
we taxpayers will, in effect, cough up some $4 billion to help America’s richest bank pay for
its wrongdoing.
This
corporate tax scam puts the “con” in unconscionable.
But We
the People can shame Dimon and his bank’s shareholders into paying the full
price for their criminal acts. To help a grassroots coalition of citizen groups
that are demanding just that, go to www.campaignforfairsettlement.org.
OtherWords columnist Jim Hightower is a radio commentator,
writer, and public speaker. He’s also editor of the populist newsletter, The
Hightower Lowdown. OtherWords.org