Do you have to be an asshole to succeed in business? Many would answer 'yes' - the rueful witnesses to the fact that in business, as in baboon troops, alpha males and females end up on top, where the combination of success, domineering natures and fawning underlings quickly turns them into horrible creeps. This is why in a list of the world's greatest assholes, business would take a disproportionate share - Kozlowski and Ebbers, 'Chainsaw Al' Dunlap, Trump, Eisner and much of the top management at Enron.
J ohn Thain is the guy that looks like a Clark Kent doll you saw grinning from page one of your paper Friday morning. Treasury was bailing out his company. There is no justice. On a good day, Merrill is worth zero. But it gets better.