[TheForge] rant concerning quality of products

[Andrew Vida]

Bruce Freeman wrote:
> This is not a problem with the workers, but with American managers.

	Not entirely so.  First of all, unions did more than their share at 
destroying this nation.  They may have started out as a noble idea, 
though I personally find them repugnant in their very concept, but they 
turned every bit as hideously corrupt as the managers they complained 
about.  Back in the early 80s we'd go to the evening shape at the NY 
Times or Daily News.  The union rules were idiotic beyond measure - 
e.g., every press had to have *6* pasters where only 1 was needed.  Five 
of them spent the night jerking off or would be sent home at full pay. 
This was not only immoral, it was illegal, but management was not 
allowed to step a toe into the pressroom to check up on who was there 
and who was not.  It was ridiculous, so complaints about management 
should never be offered without equal or greater complaint about the 
unfathomably crooked unions.

> People at the top are out to squeeze out every penny they can in the
> short term with no regard for the long term. 

	In general, this is simply untrue.  Those cases where it is are the 
ones that get all the press - and this is not to say it is not a 
problem.  It is a very grave one, as our current teetering on the brink 
of oblivion attests to.  Yet none of these people are being called to 
account for their crimes in courts of law.  One should be asking why 
that is so.  One should at least be asking why so many of them are 
actually being vastly rewarded for their crimes.  Can you say BIZARRO?