The Power of Organization and Wealth

I draw one moral from two different stories in today's Washington Post. 

• In one, South Korean men are searching for brides in China and Vietnam.  According to the story the Korean men are too poor to attract a Korean bride, so they exploit the difference in wealth to go to Vietnam for a woman from a poor background who's hoping to jump up in status.
• In the other, the Kurds in Iraq are expanding the territory they control, and according to the story the people being brought under their control are accepting it.  Order and security are better than a ruling elite of one's own ethno-religious affiliation.

My moral: the old "golden rule"--he who has the gold rules, modified to say, he who has what people want (money, order) rules.  That's cynical, but it's also rewarding those who provide what people want (and only hurting the poor Vietnamese peasant man and the ideologue in Iraq who puts ideas above human welfare).