Is it fair? I’ve got $480 million, I don’t give a D@#$.

(AP) Lehman sought millions for execs while seeking aid
(Reuters) Lehman’s Fuld falls on sword as Congress bares teeth

Richard Fuld, CEO of the bankrupted Lehman Brothers, disputed the figure that Henry Waxman came up with. It wasn’t $480,000,000 that he received over the last 7 years at Lehman Bros. It was really closer to $310 million. WTF? What in God’s name is anybody going to do with over 300 million dollars? Buy a palace? Does anyone remember waaaaaaaayyyy back when a million dollars was a LOT of money? Back in the 50s I think. Probably until the price of gold floated. Now it’s chicken feed. If you don’t have a million in the bank, you’d better not retire. Making a million a year? Upper middle class. And at the same time people are making these ungodly obscene amounts of money–for driving a respected firm into bankruptcy–there are entire families in these United States that are trying to make do with under $15,000 a year. That’s thousands. A million times LESS than the billions that are now the marker of wealth.

And do you want to know what this asshole Fuld was doing? As the Titanic was sinking? He was making sure that the executives got their full multi-million dollar salaries before bankruptcy was to be declared.

What Do You Mean There’s No Funsies Table At This Casino? I Need A Do-Over…

Ahhhhh, supply-siders and free marketeers, squealing like little pigs when it’s THEIR tails that get caught. I once defined “stoicism” (as known to the ancient Greeks) as the philosophy of the rich and powerful. It’s easy to believe that things are the way they are because either it’s the best way or the only way for them to be…when you’re on top. The Free Market solves everything. Perhaps it is solving THIS. It’s time we got rid of the tinhorn gamblers who are playing high-finance poker with our lives, our money, our welfare. But watch how fast Mr. MBA rushes around saying, “We’ve got to bail out the banks right away!” After all, it’s HIS base that’s in trouble now. We rush into things too much in this country. Let’s make this bail-out do more for the people who’ve really been hurt, the ones who’ve lost homes and jobs. It’s just too bad that we can’t grab the assholes who bailed themselves out with their golden parachutes and have skipped town.

Maybe that’s the ticket for John McCain. He desperately wants to invade SOMEWHERE. Perhaps it’s time to invade the Cayman Islands? 🙂

Trust Them, They’ll Know How To Use The Money

Don’t any of these guys who are sooooooooooooo Christian ever read the Bible? I’m thinking of Joseph and the Pharoah’s Dream. The seven fat cows and the seven lean cows? Joseph advised Pharoah to store up grain for the next seven years so that when a famine struck in the eighth year for seven years afterwards, they’d have enough grain to ride out the crisis. Bill Clinton stored up the grain for eight years. What did Bush do as soon as he took office? He gave it all away. Now, because of an unnecessary war, a few natural disasters, and a crisis in housing and finance that threatens to swallow the entire economy of the United States, guess what? There’s no grain for the lean years.

How to fix the banking crisis? Well, the Bush plan is to give money away to the spendthrift institutions, at the discretion of the Treasury Secretary, but with no oversight, no input, no help for the homeowners whose defaulted-upon mortgages cast the snowball that rolled into this avalanche. And do it fast, right now, no debate. For once, the Congress looks like it may halt that idiocy. After all, who’s going to pay for that $700 billion bailout. The taxpayers, the little people that Bush and his cronies are so contemptuous of. That’s right, you and me.

Isn’t complete and total incompetency an impeachable offense?