Monday, September 29, 2008

Burn Baby, Burn: In which I compare Titans of Finance with Roman pudding addicts

It's a disco inferno on Wall Street today.

I'm not going to be happy once my 401(k) evaporates, my customers all go out of business, and my job leaves for a more stable economy...like Afghanistan.  But, for a moment at least, the humbling ruination of pathologically reckless financial titans is gratifying.

People complain about greed as the root cause of the USA's economic meltdown.  It's not.  I'm greedy.  You are too.  If you deny it, I'll know you're lying.  Everybody wants some.  I want some too.  Wisdom for the ages courtesy of that monetary guru, David Lee Roth.  [All you Zionist conspiracy nuts ought to like that one.  Idiots.]

Big deal!  This has been going on since time began.  It is human nature:  Poor men want to be rich, rich men want to be kings, and kings ain't satisfied until they rule everything.  [Ha, Gotcha!  Springsteen's a Catholic.  That ought to set off the Papist conspiracy nuts.]  Speaking of Rome, just ask any centurion who noticed that his buddy got an extra salt allotment.  He killed that other guy in his sleep and took the extra salt for himself.  Go ahead, ask him.

Or just ask any 4th grader in the cafeteria line which pudding cup has one angstrom unit more than all the others.

No, this isn't about greed.  It's recklessness; selfish disregard for any and all consequence.  The same sort of mentality of a serial killer or rapist.  Or even the punk doing doughnuts on your lawn in his bitchin' IROC-Z.  I want it.  Now.  And I don't care about the devastation to you.  Or me.  Just give me that froth of fleeting joy.  And some more.  Now.  Ad infinitum.  Whoo hoo.

Hell, I've heard of heroin addicts with greater moral restraint!

Well cold turkey is a bitch for junkies and financial types alike.  They're both deathly intoxicated on the poison of their choice.  Dependent on the power it gives them to command their fantasy.  Except smack addicts are usually pretty humble; fully aware their activities are frowned upon by straight folk.

These "wizards" -- who bundled & sold debt, currency, equity, commodities, taxes, revenues, et al into byzantine derivatives that even our greatest & smartest economists can't understand! -- display more god-syndrome arrogance than commonly associated with cardiac surgeons, guys and dolls who actually hold the power of life and death in their hands.  Your cardiologist might be an asshole, but at least he saved a life or 100 in his career.

So until tomorrow comes and my 401(k) is a 100.25(f), I'm savoring the fall of all these false gods.

What?  No bailout from Washington means a terrible new Great Depression?  Well, you can always bail out from the 19th floor.

That's a lesson from the last Great Depression these douche bags could learn...at the very least.

 - Sam Gribley

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