My good friend, Buzz Armfield-of-the-Asheboro-Armfields woke me up at just before 6 AM this morning with a phone call.
I was going to admonish him (again) for the jolt to my metabolic system & blood pressure that such early morning phone calls incite (because it's usually at STAT C-Section), but he cut me off by the announcement that the Greensboro News & Heckler had reported (in a big black bold headline), that Community One Bank (formerly First National) in Asheboro is now under strict Federal control . . . our local leaders having run the once-solid-&-respected institution into the ground . . . in much the same "it's all about a fast buck for the big guns" fashion they "killed" our little town.
Regular readers might remember that, in the spirit of good-ole-boydom that permeates everything in Asheboro . . . including a mill-town Board of Directors/District Attorney insulating two non-profit hospital executives from the consequences of their perjury, contempt and fraud (which should also be a matter for the Feds). . . the architect of the bank's failure, Mike Miller, was able to quietly "retire", and then land very softly in a new cush job at Pfieffer College . . . courtesy of recommendations from Asheboro big-guns like N.C. Commerce Secretary Keith Crisco.
In Governor Bev Perdue's new climate of ethics and accountability, the irony of the state's Commerce Secretary toting water for Asheboro's equivalent of Enron-chief, Ken Lay, has apparently been lost on our local "journalists" at the Courier Tribune . . .
. . . who, as far as I can tell this morning, have not reported the story. They are, of course, behind a paywall and before that I was banned from commenting on the site (big whup), so I could be wrong. But I kinda doubt it.
The spiders (aka vermin) over there are scrambling today to put up a nice spin for their corporate masters tomorrow. The News & Record's story will be styled as "old news".
(Besides, since nobody has any money, they really need to keep pushing that Reader's Digest contest.)
I've been informed that once upon at time (the fine-upstandings in Asheboro call it "ancient history"), Randolph Hospital's over $700,000/year man, Robert Morrison justified his treatment of Dr. Mary Johnson to his "non-profit" Board of Directors (which, for all of Bob's efforts to conceal their identities, included the aforementioned Mike Miller), by opining that Mary just "did not fit in" in Asheboro (despite having been raised there).
And I'm thinking this morning, "Damned Straight!".
1/18 Update:
Someone else's thought on the underlying culture-of-right-upstanding-corruption in Asheboro that "Panacea" (over on the News & Record's thread) doesn't think is the least bit relevant:
"These guys would steal the Last Supper and then show up first-in-line at the Resurrection of Jesus Christ to be forgiven for it."
Yep. Don't I know it.
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2 comments:
Hey, I just had an idea, suppose Randolph Hospital buys out CommunityOne....then they could loan money to folks needing medical treatment at a modest rate, say 9%-12%, and make even more profit. That way you could justify paying Bobby and Stevie the big bucks. And prosperity returns to Asheboro....
I've wondered, given how "in-bed" Randolph Hospital has ALWAYS been with First National (sharing board members and such) if the hospital really IS in the good financial shape they keep telling everyone they're in (to justify those absurd salaries).
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