Thom Hartman on Alternet CEOs in America make as much money as they do because there really is a shortage of people with their skill set. And it’s such a serious shortage that some companies have to pay as much as $1 million a day to have somebody successfully do the job.

But what part of being a CEO could be so difficult—so impossible for mere mortals—that it would mean that there are only a few hundred individuals in the United States capable of performing it?

In my humble opinion, it’s the sociopath part.

CEOs of community-based businesses are typically responsive to their communities and decent people. But the CEOs of most of the world’s largest corporations daily make decisions that destroy the lives of many other human beings.

Only about 1 to 3 percent of us are sociopaths—people who don’t have normal human feelings and can easily go to sleep at night after having done horrific things. And of that 1 percent of sociopaths, there’s probably only a fraction of a percent with a college education. And of that tiny fraction, there’s an even tinier fraction that understands how business works, particularly within any specific industry.

Not much to add to that. One of those things that ought not, however, to linger in the shadows of radical thought but be brought front and center: Here You Are. This is Why.

How to identify a sociopath: any remorse? Any urge to repair?

I think it is important to notice, we live again in an age of Robber Barons. Of the excessive, obscene wealth, building virtual mansions as if Newport … and perhaps one day their Hamptons atrocities and yachts will go on display much as the homes of the Vanderbilts of another era.

You would think, though, that with all this damn communication, people would get sicker of being robbed faster , but that’s the neat thing about predatory behavior, you have weakened your victim, by your predation, and made them even less able to Take Measures.

It’s a long, long way from there to revolution, which is what hedge fund managers count on. To revolt, you have to be desperate enough to kill, and to die. No, this way is much more comfy, and can go on for a long, long time. Theoretically, free elections in a free country … but what happens when the leaders of both parties really work for the rich? When the establishment, the Suits, when it’s all Robber Baron thinking—without conscience?

Barack Obama probably has a conscience. But the man is African-American and our elected President; that pretty much sums up his astonishing political skills. Which means he’s one of the Suits. It’ll be interesting to see where that goes.

Tags: obama, robber barons, wealth

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