The War on Greed
I thought I’d surf on over to the Corner to see what the NROniks thought of John McCain’s populist turn earlier today, but I didn’t really see anything. But from my own perspective, it’s interesting how much weight McCain wants to put on greed as the causal factor here:
The working people of this state and this nation are the most innovative, the hardest working, the best skilled, most productive, most competitive in the world. This foundation of our economy, the American worker, is strong but it has been put at risk by the greed and mismanagement of Wall Street and Washington. The top of our economy is broken. We have seen self-interest, greed, irresponsibility and corruption undermine the hard work of the American people. It is time to set things right, and I promise to get the job done as your president.
I suppose nobody’s going to speak out in favor of “greed,” but just like when McCain was bashing Mitt Romney in the primaries for having spent time in the private sector, this is pretty strange stuff. Does McCain really think it’s that terrible for people in the business world to be motivated by self-interest? Does he really think that as president he’s going to find a way to put a stop to greed? Unless this means nothing at all, then it’s incredibly utopian.
My suspicion is that it means nothing at all. Just like how McCain is against crazy CEO compensation packages but doesn’t intend to do anything about it, he’s also against greedy Wall Street types but doesn’t intend to do anything about them, either. He’s long on moralism, and short on practical policy solutions.
86 Responses to “The War on Greed”
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September 16th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
It’s very simple really. He’ll get them all in a room and tell them very clear that they need to, “cut the shit”. His steely resolve will bring them in line and solve our economy’s woes.
September 16th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
McCain will follow greed to the gates of hell.
September 16th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
Apropos of nothing, but I woke up this morning, and Wall Street was on AMC. Turned it on just as Gekko was making the speech at the Teldar Paper shareholders meeting…
Anyway, back to whatever it is Matthew is talking about.
September 16th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
When George Wallace lost his first race for governor, he vowed he would never be “outsegged” again. Savy Republicans learn not to be out-Populist demagogued.
September 16th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Also savvy Republicans.
September 16th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
BTW, here’s the beginning of Gekko’s speech:
It amazed me that a movie made 20+ years ago captures today’s rhetoric so well. Everything old is new again, I suppose…
September 16th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
I’m not so sure McCain or his cronies would know what to do about Wall Street. The central tools conservatives have for dealing with the economy are blowing up in their face right now. This whole business reminds me of the collapse of communism. A powerful meme being publicly debunked by force majuere.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Well, d-uh.
The GOP foreign policy is a “war on terror”, which is after all an emotion, not an enemy.
So naturally the GOP domestic policy is to attack “greed” — a vice, not a vocation, nor even a condition.
Even if you make large concessions to the vague language, a war on terror aims at the tactic (terrorism) rather than the strategy or the war aims of our enemies. It’s hard to help our allies and erode our opponents if we don’t start with their war aims, contrasted with ours, and attack their strategy with a better one.
And ‘greed’ as the problem with our economy? Obama ought to give the Gekko coda — “greed is good”, the way fire is good: controlled.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
John McCain: “This foundation of our economy, the American worker, is strong but it has been put at risk by the greed and mismanagement of Wall Street and Washington.”
The American worker is an “it”. Nice.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
“He’s long on moralism, and short on practical policy solutions.”
The fact that this description could apply to both major party candidates this year to an unusual degree is part of the reason why this is an election of unusually low consequentiality.
It’s post-partisan mania! We could just have both McCain and Obama drop out and elect Bloomberg by acclamation!
I’ll vote for the Democratic lieberman over the Republican lieberman. But that doesn’t mean they’re still not both liebermans.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:13 pm
ABC News: “Republican ticket mates John McCain and Sarah Palin Monday blasted corporate executives who leave their company with a “golden parachute” and pledged to “stop multimillion dollar payouts” to CEOs, seeming to forget their own top economic adviser Carly Fiorina walked away with $45 million, including a $21.4 million severance package when she was dismissed by Hewlett Packard in 2005.”
McCain seems to have a habit of speaking out strongly against things that he or his advisers take part in. Weird.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:14 pm
The American worker is an “it”. Nice.
The foundation is an “it.” Dashes would have set off the dependent clause more precisely, and I think we should generously assume that Senator McCain intended dashes here. I’m still not gonna vote for him.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:18 pm
Does he really think that as president he’s going to find a way to put a stop to greed?
Yes.
But through shame, not regulation.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
Roll the tape! GekkoTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaKkuJVy2YA
September 16th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
The fact that this description could apply to both major party candidates this year to an unusual degree is part of the reason why this is an election of unusually low consequentiality.
Even granting for the sake of argument that the first part of this sentence is true (although it’s not), Petey ignores foreign policy entirely. Not only is this bad from a policy perspective — wars are bad! — but it’s short sighted politics. If the Dems want long term success in presidential elections (a necessary condition for liberal domestic policy), they need to get people to stop viewing Republicans as stronger on national defense. The only way to do that is to elect Democratic presidents that get good results by reversing wrong headed Republican policies. So in terms of foreign policy, this election absolutely has high “consequentionality.”
September 16th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
the key bit of this speech is here:
“This foundation of our economy, the American worker, is strong”
you see, he said something stupid yesterday about the economic fundamentals being strong, and obama nailed him. bam!!
now mccain is staggering around trying to defend that stupid line, pretending that what he really meant was that *american workers* are strong. honest. that’s what he really meant, when he said something unbelievably stupid
so mccain is off balance and reeling, throwing good air-time after bad. he’s trying to defend against a successful attack yesterday, and just saying stupider things as a result.
the lesson here is: obama landed a solid blow. mccain can’t cope with it. his message people are rattled, and so is he.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
Does McCain really think it’s that terrible for people in the business world to be motivated by self-interest?
I think he thinks he does. If you look at what motivates McCain, it’s a passionate conviction that he stands for “service to a cause greater than one’s self”. Ironically, the kind of public policy he stands behind as a Republican repudiates that principle in abject worship at the altar of laissez-faire capitalism. But that’s been McCain’s m.o. for the entirety of his political career. Stake out the “I cannot be bought/service to greater cause” ground and then act shocked and horrified when it’s violated by the lobbyists, businessmen, cronies, crooks and other sundry Republican slimeballs that, on closer inspection, he himself invited in and associated with willingly. His defense is invariably the same tautology: Me corrupt? That can’t be because I put honor and country above all else.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
McCain’s idea, I suppose, is to bring about apocalyptic circumstances in which heroic self-sacrifice and collective mobilization are not merely admirable, but necessary. While there were profiteers in World War 2, the American race by and large pulled together, sacrificed, and mobilized for the war.
If McCain can push our nation’s circumstances from “disaster” to “götterdämmerung,” perhaps greed will be less of a factor in our economy. Isn’t that part of the idea of National Greatness conservatism? “If we make life suck enough, then virtues that people display as a way of surviving severely sucky circumstances will come admirably to the fore.”
September 16th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
I wonder where the “greedy” types who are attending the Streisand/Obama fundraising dinner stole their money?? Hmmm…
The real untold story are the “community organizer” types (and their political cronies) who lobbied for relaxed lending standards in the mortgage industry. The American economy takes a tumble when people with lousy credit, no money down and not enough income to make ARM payments. The mortgage industry finally succumbed to the pressure of being called “racists” and then licked their greedy chops over the commissions generated.
September 16th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Does anyone understand what “fundamentals” are? They’re not cyclical ups and downs; they’re not even bubbles and their aftermath. Instead they’re our skilled, hard working people and our incomparable capital structure that makes us the most productive economy in the world. Also, the liberty we still enjoy. These strengths will stand us in good stead unless we let the leftists dismantle them.
Look at this interactive chart from the NYT of what has transpired in our financial sector over the past 11 months. What other nation could have withstood the loss of the capital of some of its biggest banks? This was caused by ridiculously easy credit and its predictable consequences. We’ve also taken a body blow from high energy prices, but we’re still standing. Our economy may be temporarily weak, but we’re certainly not in a depression, perhaps not even a recession. Is this a great country, or what?
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/09/15/business/20080916-treemap-graphic.html
September 16th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Like many Republicans, McCain thinks the government should basically do nothing. So he’s perfectly fine talking about how he’s for or against something — as long as nobody expects him to direct the government to actually do anything about it. Another example: he’s supposedly in favor of equal pay for women. But he voted against the bill to allow women who are denied equal pay a fair chance to sue. That’s McCain: hypothetically in favor of the right thing, but in the final analysis, against actually making it happen.
He would be totally at sea as president, wondering why everybody expects him to DO things.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:04 pm
“it’s short sighted politics. If the Dems want long term success in presidential elections (a necessary condition for liberal domestic policy), they need to get people to stop viewing Republicans as stronger on national defense. The only way to do that is to elect Democratic presidents that get good results by reversing wrong headed Republican policies. So in terms of foreign policy, this election absolutely has high “consequentionality.””
A perfectly valid scenario, Led. Things like this are why I’m voting D.
But there are a whole lot of other valid scenarios competing out there that don’t cut in our favor that leave the entire equation balanced out enough to make this an election of unusually low consequentiality.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:05 pm
Pay no attention to “mighty aphrodite,” she’s merely looking for a good time.
But I will say, from a rhetorical/political stand point, McCain is making the right move here. He’s using rhetoric to confuse the public. Obama should be seizing the economy by leaps and bounds, but a majority of Americans think McCain will do more to help them.
This is a problem that we need to start addressing. Not just messaging, but getting out the message. Obama should be a lot more heated, forthright, and visceral. He needs to fully own the economy, which he, sadly is not.
And as far as the “greed” thing goes, while I get MY’s point, I do think it is rather healthy to acknowledge the level of greed we are dealing with. At least in earlier days, when industrialists weren’t murdering unionists, they at least acted like they were a part of the social compact. I do not see that today. So I really can’t buy into the self interest is utilitarian bullshit.
And, on a more “political” note, the greed thing resonates with a lot of people who have a hard time placing their anger. McCain is using this tagline, however empty, to exploit peoples’ rightful economic anxiety and assure them he understands.
Obama has got to get on the train before it is too late.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
This is where McCain’s full on lie-fest will hurt him. If he was in a position to credibly pivot to populist economics, that together with Palin providing the fuel for control war and white working class resentment could have converted his convention bounce into a solid lead. If he hadn’t turned off his base in the MSM, they would be running cover for him on his populist pivot while Obama struggled to point out that it totally contrary to the ideology McCain has subscribed to for 26 years. Instead, Obama will respond to McCain’s pivot by saying it’s all BS (which it is) and it will stick because of the already forming media narrative that McCain is now McLie.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
That elision from ‘fundamentals’ to ‘foundation’ is grade-A bullshit. You could fertilize Nebraska on that amount of bullshit.
McCain is making the right move here. He’s using rhetoric to confuse the public.
Oh, sure. But Obama just points to the corporate high-class hookers who comprise McCain’s economic team. And surrogates can talk Keating 5.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:16 pm
The best exegesis I’ve seen of Obama’s statement yesterday on the economic crisis. http://www.suitablyflip.com/suitably_flip/2008/09/how-come-i-woul.html
September 16th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
the lesson here is: obama landed a solid blow. mccain can’t cope with it. his message people are rattled, and so is he.
We have a winner. The amount of whining on the GOP side is a good index. Carleton Sheets Fiorina proved herself incapable of running a lemonade stand.
Instead they’re our skilled, hard working people and our incomparable capital structure that makes us the most productive economy in the world.
Er, no. Within an economic superstructure that rewards executive failure, the pursuit of quarterly numbers and showboating for CNBC, skilled, hard-working people are… well, they’re suckers.
A fucktard driving a Porsche is going to put it in a ditch. The Republicans think that it’s not only okay that fucktards should drive Porsches, but that they should be compensated when they walk away from the wreck. They might say otherwise, but that’s what they do.
But ‘E’ will tell us that the ability to magic up billions of dollars of fake money is what makes America great. Because ‘E’ is a fool.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:22 pm
This is a particularly clueless comment for a former philosophy major. There is a clear moral difference between greed and a mere regard for self interest, just as there is a difference between lust and mere libido; between gluttony and mere hunger; and between egomaniacal pride and mere self-esteem.
Yes, indeed, it is true that the real problem here goes beyond the greed itself, to the fact that executive compensation is now so far decoupled from actual job performance that these executives don’t have sufficient incentive to manage their companies well. Of course greed and corruption are part of why we have these outrageous compensation packages in the first place. But even more important than the economy-wide structural problems that set absurd compensation packages, and allow executives to take a bundle with them even when they fail, is the lack of oversight that allows them to fail in the first place.
Greed is a problem, though, throughout our society. It fuels the profound cynicism and wretched moral corruption that are destroying the moral fabric of our institutions everywhere you look. And it’s a problem that is particularly easy for ordinary people to see.
The question is which candidate is going to have the balls to put his policy where his populist mouth is, and propose regulating executive salaries as part of a package of long-overdue regulatory reforms. If the Democrat gets out-maneuvered here on his class warfare home turf by a Republican, that will be the last straw for the enfeebled Democratic Party.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Led, you’re right that “McCain is McLie” is the new “media narrative”. It helps having those dinosaurs on your side. No body trusts them anymore and they’re hemorrhaging money and eyeballs, but they can still pull off a good smear.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:32 pm
pseudo, U.S. GDP is over $45,000 per capita, but, yeah, the fundamentals are no damn good.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
This is that whole bizarre Republican focus on judging candidates by how well they express the right feelings, as opposed to actually getting results.
It’s like how George Bush responded to critiques of how the Iraq war was a strategic catastrophe built on falsehoods by telling us how awful he felt when soldiers died.
Who cares how these guys feel? How’s about they just focus on getting the job done, as opposed to making sure we all know they are morally right and fit inside?
Seriously, these guys wouldn’t last 10 minutes as surgeons.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Awesome! I can’t wait to use some of my new GDP per capita money to help pay bills!
September 16th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Get off your butt.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:50 pm
pseudo, U.S. GDP is over $45,000 per capita, but, yeah, the fundamentals are no damn good.
I’m starting to suspect that E. O’Neal is some kind of satirical performance artist, like Stephen Colbert or the blogger Jon Swift.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
Wow, Matt, you really make it sound as if maybe you think there is nothing wrong with greed at all, or that there is nothing that should/can be done to counter its worst effects. It would be great if you could clarify to show us whether you are talking only about McCain, or about your own opinions.
It’s odd– I would have thought that the obvious way to respond to this is to say that McCain’s obviously spouting bullshit because he’s obviously greedy. Really odd that you chose to go about it in this alternate, very ambiguous (and conservative-sounding) way.
Thumbs down.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
J.G., you’re right. An economy that produces only $45,000 in goods and services per person can’t be any good. We should probably go back to subsistence farming, if not hunting and gathering. Now that would be fundamentals! Or perhaps the Cuban model, where everyone is equally poor, except the commissars.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
So I take it that McCain thinks that in order to prevent the horrendous financial situation we’re in from occurring again, we need to reform the hearts and minds of America’s capitalists, because excessive regulation would clearly stifle the market and getting people to act nicely is easy.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
An economy that produces only $45,000 in goods and services per person can’t be any good.
Not if fucktards like you have any role in what to do with it. And I don’t see your boys wanting to change that.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
You liberals are stupid. Our economy is much stronger than that of the Central African Republic. So shut up. And go talk to Wall Street about greed and stuff, where it will do real good.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
E.C., you’re sputtering.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
You too, pseudo.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
I get it. So if we produce $45,000 in good and services per person we can pretend the unemployment rate is low, inflation is low, wages are up, home are not being foreclosed, and stock market is not dropping, the dollar is strong, energy prices are down, etc., etc., and then everything is OK.
Damn. E. O’Neal’s ignorance is awesome dudes!
September 16th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
The Bush Treasury Department, like the Clinton Treasury Department before it, warned for years about the excesses of Freddie and Fannie and of the ridiculous lack of credit standards, inadequate capital and regulatory oversight. The big Dems in Congress, like Franks and Dodd, protected the GSEs, which enthusiastically fed the mortgage bubble. Eventually, all bubbles burst, just as do Ponzi schemes like Social Security and Medicare. They’re fun while they last, but you feel like hell the next morning.
That our economy is still standing is not nothing.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
Tip of the cap to you E. O’Neal you have successfully ruined yet another thread with your meaningless drivel.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:16 pm
I’ve Seen the Light, those are problems, not fundamentals. When you have the flu, you feel awful, but if your health is fundamentally good, you get over it. The leftists want this to be Marx’s “crisis of capitalism”, but it ain’t.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
Well, depending upon your measure, even during the lowest points of the Great Depression, the “fundamentals” were strong, compared to somewhere or another. So there.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
It’s obvious that the way to punish uncontrollable greed is to give tax cuts to the greedy. Q. E. D.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
El Cid, during the Great Depression, GDP fell 30% and unemployment averaged over 18% — for a decade!
September 16th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
um matt, your favorite presidential candidate, you know,the one who cheated on his dying wife-he based his entire campaign on more extreme denunciations of greed than mccain just did.
September 16th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
Eventually, all bubbles burst, just as do Ponzi schemes like Social Security and Medicare. They’re fun while they last, but you feel like hell the next morning.
This can’t be the same ‘E’ who said that calling out a bubble as a bubble is irresponsible and panics the market, can it? I mean, no-one is that fucking incoherent, are they…? Or… oh!
John McCain, congratulations on getting online!
September 16th, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Yes, but employment started out from a much higher level than many nations average — for a decade after the Sandinistas were voted out, Nicaragua had 50 – 75% unemployment. So the ‘fundamentals were strong’ even during the worst of the Great Depression! Yay! Fun game!
Plus John McCain said that by “fundamentals” he meant “American Workers”, and how dare you suggest that American Workers weren’t strong during the hardest times in Our Nation’s History? (Well, except for the actual malnutrition and preventable wasting diseases rampant throughout the South…)
September 16th, 2008 at 9:20 pm
pseudo, the bubble burst some time ago. Now, we’re dealing with the damage. My point Sunday night, when the markets were panicked, was that the underlying American economy is strong and we’re not going into a depression — unless opportunistic Dems talk us into one. As FDR said, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself”. Panics, like runs on Wall Street banks, feed on themselves. The Democrats promoting panic and economic defeatism must not be too worried about the factory workers and waitresses who would lose their jobs and homes as a result.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
There are no objective problems — just skittish market actors who Democrats frighten into hurting us.
Operation: THE LAST 7.5 YEARS OF REPUBLICAN LEADERSHIP IN WASHINGTON DC, AND ESPECIALLY REPUBLICAN ABSOLUTE RULE 2002 – 2006 NEVER, EVER, EVER HAPPENED proceeds apace.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
It’s necessary to talk about these issues. The GOP’s triumphant failures on economic policy, with John McCain backing them, are largely to blame for what’s happening around us. So you’re saying that Democrats should keep their mouths shut on the economy so as not to induce panic, despite the fact that we’re in this position to begin with is the fault of the GOP? Moreover, the big movers in business aren’t taking their cues on the economy from what Democratic candidates say.
I cry bullshit, good sir.
September 16th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
“Dems talk us into one??”
You mean Dems like Alan Greenspan? Dems at the head of all those big companies going under? McCain?
September 16th, 2008 at 10:20 pm
Well, ‘E’ has the party line now. ‘Support the workers’ from the party of capital is like ’support the troops’ from the party of illegal bullshit wars.
September 16th, 2008 at 10:26 pm
We don’t want to end greed. The myth of self discipline is just that, a myth. What we want to do is harness it for the good of the community. Let those driven by greed be satisfied, but within a structure that we legislate… yes, regulation. The idea that those driven by greed will discipline themselves is completely ridiculous.
It’s like in football. You want the most aggressive players there are so you have a good game. But you don’t want them tearing each others heads off. So you make up rules and enforce them. You harness their aggressiveness and you get a great competitive game but without the blood, gore, death and dismemberment.
Then in another sense we need regulation because of the size. When business was all local, the social pressures of living in the same neighborhoods and towns provided the necessary discipline to those motivated by greed. If they got too greedy they would be shunned in one way or another. But with distance, we need agreed upon regulation. Yep.
September 16th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
“The love of money is the root of all evil.”
Jesus Christ
Phil Gramm, Robert Rubin, take your pick. Magoo married a bony bag of gold. Now, he’s railing against it?!
September 16th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
McCain said the “fundamentals” are sound. Dems say the economy is cratering. Anyone who believes that b.s. should sell his stocks, close his accounts, bury his money in the back yard, and not buy a car, house, or any other deferrable purchase, because they’re probably going to lose their job. If enough people do that, the prophesy becomes self-fulfilling. Panics are irrational crowd behavior, just like bubbles. Bubbles are caused by too easy credit, panics by the sudden withdrawal of credit.
September 16th, 2008 at 11:54 pm
Democrats, shut up. You are causing this problem by talking about it wrong. Shut up and let Republicans keep running this country right and everything will work out on its own, or not, and if it doesn’t, it’s your fault, because you talked about it.
September 17th, 2008 at 1:01 am
El Cid, it’s appropriate to talk about serious economic problems. What I consider inappropriate is the ignorant, alarmist rhetoric from Obama and others that gives the impression that our economic system is on the verge of collapse. If Americans believe the Dems, they’ll stop spending and stop hiring, and lots of innocent people will be hurt.
September 17th, 2008 at 1:47 am
Yeah, we start thinking we’re in some sort of financial crisis, and then before you know it, all the top investment banks go bankrupt and the government buys AIG and the stock market plummets and then we’re screwed.
Look how much damage Obama has already caused.
September 17th, 2008 at 2:43 am
Obama has not employed ignorant and alarmist rhetoric — he just hasn’t used the soporifics right wingers would prefer used to describe a crisis once again erupting on the Republicans’ watch.
September 17th, 2008 at 2:56 am
“Bubbles are caused by too easy credit” Yes, and easy credit is caused by bubbles. Incidentally, life will cause death, but I get all frowny face when pithiness defies its converse.
September 17th, 2008 at 3:01 am
Would Cindy McCain be considered greedy or an fundamental economic unit? How many jets and houses cause the electorate moral compass to point N by NW? Just wondering…
September 17th, 2008 at 3:34 am
Are earmarks part of the culture of greed and corruption or fundamental economic units? What about tanning beds? Tanning salons greedy, tanning beds fundamental. Mooseburgers are definitely fundamental economic units, yet I find the Moose greedy, nay I say, corrupt. Except Bullwinkle, he’s fundamental in his zen-ness. How about haircuts? You can’t have a viable discussion about contemporary political-economics with some sort of slam on candidate haircuts. Has Governor Palin’s haircut costs somehow escaped scrutiny? For shame. Haircuts greedy, not fundamental economic units. Naughty Monkey’s? Naughty Monkey’s, if in Imelda Marcos quantities, are definitely fundamental economic units. Press Bar-B-Qs? Fundamental economic units, no doubt. One whole pillar of the modern economy no doubt. More Arizona Pressers over Bar-B-Qs. We can levitate a thousand investment banks with candidate haircuts and Arizona press Bar-B-Qs. How about lying? Lying should definitely be a fundamental economic unit. No economy would be able to function without lying. Lying pays for itself if you amortize it correctly. Bilking? Perhaps I go too far. Bilking may come back into vague after this week. This week, bilking is corrupt, if not greedy. Bilking vulnerable people, never out of fashion. Bilking vulnerable people is a fundamental economic unit. A cornerstone of any nutritious economic diet must include a good amount of bilking. We welcome bilking back into the sacred tapestry of fundamental economic units.
September 17th, 2008 at 8:03 am
Anyone who believes that b.s. should sell his stocks, close his accounts, bury his money in the back yard, and not buy a car, house, or any other deferrable purchase, because they’re probably going to lose their job.
You’ve got it all wrong. Another example of creating two false choices to make your choice seem logical. You really have no clue.
MATT, please get better trolls, this E. O’Neal character is fading fast, real fast.
September 17th, 2008 at 8:09 am
I’ve Seen the Light, those are problems
Well, yes, that’s the point isn’t it?
September 17th, 2008 at 8:53 am
He’s long on moralism, and short on practical policy solutions.
I don’t mean to be impolite, but why the fuck even bother with pointing this out anymore? He’s a Republican candidate for national office.
September 17th, 2008 at 9:57 am
The vague ramblings of a demonstrably dishonest man are less worrisome to them than a credibble threat that the tax structure will be made more progressive.
September 17th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Nonsense. You forgot to factor in inflation. You need to dump stocks, buy bonds and precious metals and spend money on any reasonable durable goods you can. Well, you had to do it years ago, but fortunately, I did.
Even in disastrous economic times, most people do not lose their jobs.
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