Joe Pitts: “Yesterday we watched on television as several crooked corporate executives were arrested and carted off to jail by Bush…”

“Yesterday we watched on television as several crooked corporate executives were arrested and carted off to jail by Bush administration officials. I have no doubt that there will be more arrests before long. These are the very worst kind of crooks. They tricked investors, stole from employees, and robbed from retirees. They should go to jail and stay there for a very long time and their ill-gotten gains should be taken back from them. I mean their mansions, their yachts, and their private airplanes, all of which were bought with money that they got through fraud. And I think we all need to take a look at what led to the scandals in the first place. The excesses of the decade of the '90s clearly got out of hand; so much so, in fact, that decade is well known as the decade of irresponsibility. And national leaders like the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, who made $18 million from a $100,000 investment in Global Crossing and then knew to get out just in exactly the same time all the crooked executives got out, should think about the example they set. But at the end of the day, President Bush and the law enforcement bodies under his command will come down hard on these corporate crooks. And that will be a powerful deterrent.”