Martin Shkreli was Arrested for the Wrong Thing

Martin Shkreli, previously famous for being a gigantic jerk, was arrested. Which is fantastic news, as far as I'm concerned. Unfortunately, he wasn't arrested for single handedly making a common and cheap life-saving drug exorbitantly expensive. He was arrested for security fraud. The short version of the story is that after losing other people's money in the stock market, he lied, and said he was doing great things with their money. To make it look more accurate, he started a company named Retrophin (which, incidentally, he used to gouge prices on already-developed drugs) whose revenue he used turn his investors losses magically into gains and also buy Wu Tang Clan albums. Unfortunately, that company Retrophin had a board, which is suing him for taking their money. And the SEC is suing him for lying to his investors. Which leads us to today, when we got to see his mugshot in the morning (making this one of the best news stories to wake up to in a while).

Great, he's arrested. But what does that say about us?

When Martin Shkreli exploited the pharmaceutical industry to line his own pockets, he wasn't doing anything illegal. There is nothing illegal about profiting from attempting to create a monopoly on a life saving drug in order to price gouge the sick. Some politicians made a hubub about it, and naturally legislation to make this sort of maneuvering illegal promptly stalled. But now we hear that justice is served, because while he was busy deciding if he wanted to deprive patients of affordable treatment or just make insurance expensive for everyone else, he was also committing securities fraud. And God forbid Martin Shkreli lie to his investors about losing their money! That gets the feds involved and a swift case in court.

The  government is going after bad guys, and that's generally a good thing. But keep your eyes peeled to see what bad guys have to do to get the government's attention. Because it's not "harm the sick/environment/needy." Those just seem to get you applause from some presidential candidates.