StatueAs the financial crisis continues to unfold, headlines increasingly focus on the pain and hardship ordinary Americans are suffering. Let us not forget that the wealth accumulated by a small handful of Americans, often at the expense of others, was obscene and remains largely intact.

Occasionally this wealth comes into view, most often when it’s about to disappear. The Wall Street Journal recently reported on a couple, Richard and Amanda Peacock (aptly named) who had fallen on hard times and were forced to auction off many of the artifacts they had accumulated.

VERO BEACH, Fla. — Richard and Amanda Peacock spent five years building their dream home, a 10,000-square-foot, orange mansion overlooking the ocean here. They filled it with leopard-skin chairs, pinball machines, antique Coca-Cola signs and six sports cars. It had a room full of 100 hunting trophies — including a hyena and the head of an elephant — and an aviary out back housing eight rare parrots.

In a sweltering auction tent on the Peacocks’ front lawn, the bidding got especially heated for the road signs, hunting trophies and the couple’s 2004 Ferrari. Frank Burden, a local landscaper, picked up Mr. Peacock’s Pennzoil sign for $75. Bidding on the scarlet Ferrari, with only 5,000 miles, reached $110,000, a steal compared with its $207,000 purchase price. Marie Davis, a Florida vacationer, picked up several exotic hunting trophies. [Mr. Peacock said he doesn’t hunt.]
”I got a wildebeest for $250!” she said. “What a deal.”

What a sad statement about the excesses of our culture. Does success truly mean that it’s OK to hoard wealth, to accumulate useless stuff that is rarely seen and whose chief value to the acquirer is to collect dust? What about using wealth to benefit others?

We endlessly hear about why the “wealthy” should not be taxed more than they already are. Now we can understand the logic: It would deprive them of another $6,000 elephant head.

photo: Adrian Pingstone

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