Guilt-Free in a $7 Million Condo

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Last week I returned to my car in a completely empty parking lot on the campus of Cornell University. There was a parking ticket flapping in the breeze under my windshield wiper, and I reacted like every other man or woman who ever received a parking ticket has reacted since the beginning of time. "This is bullshit!" I screamed to the inside of my car.

I even had to bury the ticket under the sports section of the USA Today so I wouldn't catch a glimpse of it and get aggravated all over again. "I'm not paying it," I said every three minutes during the two hour ride home.

Yesterday, I wrote a check and paid the freaking ticket. Thirty bucks gone and not a damn thing in return.

Yet it's about personal responsibility, isn't it? I could have found a meter, dug out some coins, and made a longer walk to the meeting. I didn't. I was lazy, got busted for it, and had to make amends.

So, how does this Madoff guy show his face? Allegedly, he stole about $50 billion and was granted bail. He gets to live in his $7 million condo as people jump to their deaths, crash airplanes to escape their lives, and lament the loss of every nickel they ever worked for. Today Madoff showed up for court, after mailing out over a million dollars of assets, to once again have at his bail situation looked at - the judge ruled he can remain in his home.

Besides asking how that can possibly be, I am left wondering how this guy even gets out of bed in the morning. Now I know he's still innocent until proven guilty, but doesn't he have a twinge of guilt?

He wore a bullet-proof vest to court today - he must have an inkling someone is mad at him. Hell, he even wiped out Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgewick - and who doesn't like them?

I would have never made it as a criminal I suppose and I must thank the nuns who filled me with enough guilt to start my own religion. If a cop pulls up beside me on the Thruway I start thinking about things that I might possibly be doing wrong. I could never drive the get-a-way car, I suppose.

Meanwhile, this joker that made-off with everyones money is smiling to the cameras -they should lock him up just for that.

Steal a little and they throw you in jail - steal a lot and they make you a king.

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