Free-Market Competition

Going out on a limb and guessing these best practices aren't limited to the confines of Perfidious Albion:

Some of Britain’s most respected industries routinely employ criminals to hack, blag and steal personal information on business rivals and members of the public, according to a secret report leaked to The Independent.

The Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca) knew six years ago that law firms, telecoms giants and insurance were hiring private investigators to break the law and further their commercial interests, the report reveals, yet the agency did next to nothing to disrupt the unlawful trade.

It is understood that one of the key hackers mentioned in the confidential Soca report admitted that 80 per cent of his client list was taken up by law firms, wealthy individuals and insurance companies. Only 20 per cent was attributed to the media, which was investigated by the Leveson Inquiry after widespread public revulsion following the phone-hacking scandal.

I guess if I were the parent of college-age children, I'd probably be insisting that they major in computer sciences if they expected the old man to foot the bill. Why not? We live in an era where theft-by-laptop is standard operating procedure in government, in banking, in law, in business and in media. If we can't derail this outlaw regime, I suppose the next best thing we can do is to hop on the gravy train and cash in on the grift. Yes, I know that's a cynical and defeatist attitude to take, but absent armed revolt, what other choice do we have? Elections don't seem to matter much anymore, and we can't rely on market forces to decide winners and losers because most of the markets are rigged. But regardless, it doesn't bode well for the future of liberal democracy when the marketable job skills that it rewards most richly are the same ones that work to rob it of its legitimacy.

---Baron V