Beggar's opera act 2

"But present time is ours, and nobody alive hath more. Why are the laws levelled at us? Are we more dishonest than the rest of mankind? What we win gentlemen is our own by the law of arms and the right of conquest."

Doesn't this line have a fairytale feel to it or what? That's how I look at act 2 of the Beggars opera. It just seems to be getting more and more surreal. In act 2 we go to the "club house" of the high dollar criminal Macheath and his crew. All I could think of when I was reading was about Enron. It may be a far off comparison to catch but in some way Macheath is like a modern day executives for a dirty cooperation. Can a modern thief be compared to a knight at the round table? Macheath seems to think so but I don't. What worries me is what society says makes a gentleman a gentleman? I don't think that the men in Macheath circle were gentleman. Just because they talked proper and had good manners and were form a higher social class they did trashy things. They were thieves and liars is that what knight is? This is still true today. There are still crooks in every social class. The first rule to breaking the law is, "What ever you do don't get caught." you can be a really stupid criminal as long as you don't get caught. Then your smarter then the brightest criminal who does get caught. Have you ever seen one of those movies where the popular kid at school is a total jerk but none of the teachers sees all the bad thing he dose because they can't see past his image? That is kinda how i feel about Macheath. only in act 2 he gets betrayed by his own kind. i think Macheath's weakness is going to be his ruin. we'll see what happens in act 3....