I just watched Elizabeth Warrren chew up Wells Fargo CEO Stumpf. Its good theater. But who allowed this guy up there? Why give her a pinata? She’s only going to beat it! Brilliantly too (see below).
This is the elite failure that’s crept in over the 2000’s. Bringing us all a lot of trouble.
Collective self-interest mandates that Well Fargo’s CEO Stumpf resigns loudly and bloodily after a scandal. A Bugs Bunny opera death all over the TV news. That would serve his own class’s interests, but not his own pride (and notably absent sense of shame).
In the good old days, the collective self-interest would have prevailed. The boys down at the Metropolitan Club would have sat Stumpf down and delivered the hard truth. He would have been given a moment to collect himself, left in a locked room with a loaded revolver, and immolated in an appropriately cinematic funeral pyre. He NEVER would have gotten in front of her committee except as a “broken man deeply remorseful for his shameful actions.”
Of course, 3-6 months later, he’d be back from the dead. Serving on a few boards. Enjoying his riches-minus-a-token-show-of -monetary-remorse. Golfing with the guy who handed him his resignation letter. Good sports one and all.
This is the elite breakdown that will, eventually, break down the current elites.
.@SenWarren #WellsFargo CEO: "You should resign. You should give back the money that you took…" pic.twitter.com/aPZViWGJIN
— CSPAN (@cspan) September 20, 2016
