You don’t have to be an economist to recognize GREED or a social scientist to realize that people who have prospered most from America’s opportunities are the most resistant to provide financial resources to restore the nation’s strength and health.

 

That is the sum and substance of our current economic situation, inherited by President Obama…a condition nurtured by Ronal Reagan and both Bushes – Daddy and particularly, Baby Bush.

 

As reported earlier this week President Obama called for a halt to offshore tax havens and corporate tax breaks. It is estimated that billions of dollars would be gained from the wealthiest Americans and multinational corporations.

 

But why are the people who have profited billions the most recalcitrant in giving back…to keep the nation strong, with tax dollars for schools, hospitals, libraries, police and fire departments…the crux of our thriving democracy. The top 2% in the economic hierarchy have enough dollars to provide them every luxury for the rest of their lives and their children’s lives. How much is being hoarded in the Cayman Islands and Swiss banks…and WHY?

 

Generous gifts are made to elected officials who protect their tax breaks but few are challenged about why they want their money amassed offshore…when it could be part of sustaining America. These are the folks who define patriotism with lapel flags and maneuver to shortchange the government.

 

If you read the business pages of the Times or the Wall Street Journal, you discover daily that another financial manipulator has been indicted…men with millions, if not billions, risking their freedom with the lust for more. It exposes two things. One is a sense of entitlement that they can get away with whatever they want because they always have…from frat house antics to business manipulations with political protection, and because they want more… massive accumulations…just to have it. All part of the game…

 

Let’s turn to Yankee Stadium because it is easier to identify greed when it is at home plate. They have built a new edifice which now has a shocking display of empty seats around first and third bases…the choice locations going for some $1,500 a seat, per game…some are more expensive.

 

The Yankees have made fools of us and local politicians have been a part of it. They made demands and threatened to leave the Bronx. For where? Tulsa? Salt Lake City? Yankee big money is made from their television deals in the nation’s most lucrative market, the metropolitan New York area. If they never sold a ticket the Yankees would show a profit from their TV deals. But they convinced the power brokers that a new ballpark was needed…as schools and hospitals much older than the stadium went unattended. Various tax abatements were awarded so Steinbrenner could build a new home and emulate the stadiums being created in Texas, Arizona and California with ostentatious bars and restaurants, waterfalls and, most vital of all, luxury boxes for corporate CEOs who entertain their guests and pay big dollars for their ugly displays of wealth…having little or nothing to do with the love of baseball, the American pastime, or so we thought.

 

Stadiums are now named for banks and sodas, and stores that sell paperclips and rubber bands. The corporations contribute to the political incumbents who reward them with tax breaks and their stadiums become the icing on the cake. Sports have become a national rip-off. Players take steroids so they can compete in the dollar chase…big muscles mean more homeruns and larger contracts. The TV reporters covering the game never tell the truth about the stadiums but demonize the players, replaceable fall guys in the merry-go-round. It’s all of a piece.

 

So Yankee Stadium opened this season, celebrated in the press and on TV, with a smaller seating capacity than the old ballpark. But it opened during a recession and the rush for luxury boxes and expensive seats was curtailed. The Yankees have been left with an embarrassment of empty, expensive seats. The YES TV cameras are doing gymnastics to avoid showing the wide open empty spaces.

 

The entire Yankee Stadium construction plan is a disgrace. Subway fares will go up while Mr. Steinbrenner gets a tax break. To build the new stadium they decimated parks used by neighborhood kids which have yet to be replaced because of the “fiscal crunch.” The man on the street who traditionally found relaxation and fun at the ballpark has been priced out.

 

During the upcoming mayoral election all candidates will talk with pride about rooting for and supporting the home teams…another form of “patriotism” used on the public to hide the lies and deceit.

 

This is particularly hard for those of us who cling to our childhood memories of ballgames when we cheered our favorites and felt part of something grand and healthy. Mr. Steinbrenner and the political aristocracy of this city have it taken away.

 

Call it ostentation or elitism or just conspicuous consumption. But if you want to define sports in NYC today, one word will do it. It’s GREED.

 

 

I’m David Rothenberg…out on a limb!