Couldn’t Help But Notice (072507)
Whine of the day:
Vick indictment blindsided Falcons
“We had absolutely no idea that the indictment was coming on that day at that time,” Falcons General Manager Rich McKay said at a news conference Tuesday afternoon at the team’s Atlanta office.
I didn’t know prosecutors had an implied duty to notify an employer about a pending indictment of an employee. (/sarcasm)
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Sherrod Brown’s outrageous vote — Either he really doesn’t believe that those who report what they believe is suspicious criminal or criminal activity in good faith deserve legal protection, or, fully knowing that he is shielded from voters’ wrath until 2012, he did Harry Reid’s bidding to ensure that a bill the Democratic leadership opposed wouldn’t pass.
I believe it’s the latter, for this reason: Several weeks ago, he voted against immigration shamnesty cloture after years of being a nearly across-the-board supporter of illegal-immigrants’ “rights” — waiting until he knew that the measure would fail to cast his vote. This time Brown’s political radar detected an issue that will stay alive and cause problems at re-election time.
Conclusion: A Sherrod Brown Senate vote is primarily an exercise in political calculation, not personal conviction.
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Hold the Birthday Cake — The Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) passed five years ago. Its harm is only partially measurable, in higher external audit costs and thousands of hours devoted to internal compliance (read “busywork”). Additionally, the market for initial public offerings (IPOs) has quantifiably changed for the worse:
Not long ago, about 90 percent of major IPOs were handled in this country and about 10 percent elsewhere. Now the numbers are reversed. In 2006, 350 companies raised $86 billion in European initial offerings. In the U.S., 235 companies raised $48 billion. Hong Kong too has been gaining ground as Chinese companies have largely stopped coming here for financing. Last year, New York did not participate in any of the 10 ten largest offerings.
But getting back to SOX — here’s the biggest cost:
….. less easy to quantify but certainly real is the harm to U.S. competitiveness that occurs when CEOs obsess over the tiny details of SOX compliance (lest they face jail time because a subordinate gets a detail wrong) instead of concentrating on innovation.
If, as I believe is the case, this preoccupation with bureaucratic compliance, i-dotting, and t-crossing is shaving a half-point from annual GDP growth in a $13-plus trillion economy, the biggest cost of SOX is over $65 billion in lost economic growth — which compounds on itself.
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Speaking of losing business overseas, you would think that Sherrod “Offshoring Is Evil” Brown might have something to say about the aforementioned loss of IPO business. But Brown, whose Senate home page still describes his site as “temporary,” doesn’t have much to say about anything:
Mr. Brown would be well-served to put Mrs. Brown, aka Connie “And His Lovely (But Not Humble) Wife” Schultz, into HIS currently empty newsroom. This would have two benefits: Brown would actually start proactively communicating to his constituents, and Mrs. “I’m Still an Objective Reporter Because I Say Am” Brown could leave her hopelessly conflicted position (definitely in appearance, if not in fact) at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Actually, make that three: The PD would excise the perfectly justifiable perception that its reporting and editorial positions on Mrs. Brown’s husband are incurably tainted. Would a fair and balanced PD have thus far ignored hometowner Brown’s virtually barren Senate site, or the fact that after six months in office he still (according to his contact page) has only a Cleveland office (George Cut-and-Runovich Voinovich has six)?
