August 26, 2009
I strongly support the proposed rule change facilitating shareholder director nominations. As a small business owner and an investor, I have watched for too long as directors rubber-stamp poor judgment on the part of executives who nominated them to their directorships.
Public companies belong to their owners, and I would like to see large investors have the right to nominate their own directors to correct abuses and incompetence. The current system of proxy solicitation and shareholder voting is undemocratic and promotes cronyism of the worst sort. It encourages excessive, risk taking, short-term thinking, and excessive compensation of executives. Why, for example, should the head of Exxon Mobile receive hundreds of millions in bonuses because the price of oil rises? Will he return those bonuses when the price of oil falls?
With most proxies submitted by e-mail, the cost of adding additional directors to a slate is minimal. For the good of our nation as well as the interests of equity investors, please approve the proposed rule change as written without further concessions to corporate managerial interests.