And we find that children and community are commitments that set us free. The Bush administration is not likely to ask corporate America to examine its consciences, to sacrifice, or to make greater commitments to America s children and communities. Our most powerful citizens should not be able to claim all the rights of citizenship, but bear none of its responsibilities. Why was not one word spoken on inauguration day asking corporations to make a greater commitment to the public interest. According to our new president, America, at its best, is compassionate.
Compassionate conservatism is the new administration s slogan.
Yet the man who parlayed that slogan into the presidency had nothing to say about creating corporate compassion. To be fair to him, this omission reflects something we all know to be true that corporate compassion is an oxymoron. By law, the corporation is a system dedicated to the pursuit of profit for the benefit of stockholders, i.e. its own self-interest. Compassion is not a corporate trait. Corporations exist only because laws have been enacted that provide for their creation and give them a license to operate.