Perhaps you did not notice in my post (or chose not to) that the life around us proceeds largely by the rules stated by Machiavelli - that's why all these rendells and others grab and get all they could get away with. Indeed, it is a standard conservative position to believe that everyone is, or would like to be, a rendell and then try to organize the life in such a way as to limit their appetites. If people were angels [per Federalist papers], no government and no rendell would be either necessary or even possible.
"both modesty and decency are in the eye of beholder"