In "The Charm School," one of Nelson DeMille's memorable novels, he writes of the pleasure of being a policeman in a police state. Although his setting is the Soviet Union, DeMille's description comes to mind when observing the exploitation of vague regulations in a democracy.
You didn't violate the regulations? Well, that's debatable, isn't? You may need a platoon of lawyers to sort that out. And do you really want to get bogged down in audit after audit in order to prove your innocence when the government has an unlimited budget?
For the ethicists present, let's haul out the old "appearance of impropriety" argument which can zing even those who, from all angles, never really committed any ethical violations but can be said to have created the mere appearance of doing so.
A simple proposal: Those who criticize regulations have an obligation to state just how much regulation would be appropriate. At the same time, those who favor regulations have an obligation to state how much is too much. Now that would be an interesting discussion.
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