The Left at the trough

Why is it that whenever we hear about a politician sticking his/her nose in the trough of corporate greed it seems always to be a rightwinger or conservative? Is it because it is only the conservatives that do it? Or is it because our reflexively dogmatic left wing press cannot bear to point out that everyone does it, including their heros.

Gerhard Shroeder was the Chancellor of Germany. A dyed-in-the-wool lefty if there ever was one. SPD all the way (that is the German socialist party). During his tenure in office, he was ever leaning towards Moscow and against whatever the US might have in mind. "Oh, that stands to reason," you say. "It follows in the footsteps of Willie Brandt's 'Ostpolitik' and 'Realpolitik.' And anyway, they have to be careful around their large neighbor to the East.

Never mind that the US was their to guarantee their freedom for 40 years from Moscow. Never mind that it was the US that eventually forced the walls of communism to fall. Germany has always voted in their best immediate (financial) interests. Just like the French. No wonder these two fought each other so often for so many years: you've just got to be in conflict when you each are trying to take over the world socially, economically and culturally -- not to mention militarily.

So Mr. Schroeder was a keen champion of the new trans-European gas pipeline from Russia to the West. Except that old pipeline crossed several former "allies" of Moscow on its way West. So the new pipeline was placed across the bottom of the Baltic Sea on its way to Germany -- at a staggering increase in cost to the German taxpayer. All of which only serves to guarantee Germany's supply of gas (and an increasing dependency on Russian favor), cut out the risk of offending Poland, Ukraine, and some other smaller states, and boost GAZPROM (they're Russian and state controlled) stock. So now Russia can squeeze its neighbors without hurting Germany at the same time. Convenient.

Now that Mr. Schroeder is unemployed -- having lost to Ms. Merkel, he is joining GAZPROM! That's convenient too. Join the robber barons that you just spent time protecting in screwing your former employers ... the German people. But it gets better: the CEO of the GAZPROM led consortium is another German, formerly an "East German" and a STAZI operative friendly with Putin -- who served in the former East Germany as KGB officer. So, yessir folks, if you want to see a politician at the trough, this is as good an example as you will EVER see. And redder than red. In fact, given the former occupations of the management there, you'd be hard pressed to find redder. But then again, aren't these the sort of people who abided by Lenin's maxim of the useful idiots? BTW. Stick that in your granola.