The Goldman Sachs NIghtmare Casino

After reading the excellent, must-read Matt Taibbi article The Great American Bubble Machine in the current issue of Rolling Stone I have started seeing articles wailing about the gray-suited vampire lord Goldman Sachs just about everywhere. Here's today's, from Paul Krugman at the New York Times.

The Goldman profits and the manner in which the very same people who brought the financial world to its knees last year, are getting rewarded humongous bonuses with taxpayer dollars (read: YOUR dollars) shows that what is being practiced in America is no longer capitalism but a means of socializing losses while privatizing gains. It's as though the entire financial system is a nightmare casino where, no matter what you do, the house run by Da Mob find ways to suck money out of anyone who is dumb enough to play.

What I really don't get is why people aren't more ticked off. The uber rich are p*ssing on the citizens and calling it rain. How docile and cattle-like have we Americans become? For all our flag-waving and tiny flag pins on our lapels, we have forgotten how to stand tall, to duck our heads to no man and to fight the machine.

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From Matt Taibbi's "The Great American Bubble Machine" in Rolling Stone Issue 1082-83.

QUOTE The first thing you need to know about Goldman Sachs is that it's everywhere. The world's most powerful investment bank is a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money. UNQUOTE
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Father's Day ~ They Were Working

Tomorrow is Father's Day here in the US. Millions of clueless children, both juvenile and adult, will make a plate of scrambled eggs and give Dad a touching present of some sort: a papier mache' paperweight, a new necktie or a box of his favorite cigars. Fatherhood itself, the trials and rewards of manfully providing for and guiding one's offspring through the landmines of early life, will be mentioned in homilies and sermons across the land, burgers will be grilled and then that shall be that for another year.

Ben Stein has this goodie up at NYT Business ~ here's a sample, but be sure and read the whole thing. And have a happy Father's Day!

QUOTE

“Get it in your heads that if you throw away your moral duties to your parents, you are thieves. You were born on third base and your parents put you there, and you think you hit a triple. It’s not true. It’s time to give back.

“ `Attention must be paid,’ as Arthur Miller said. So start now, and make it a habit to be grateful to your parents. Say you’re grateful and mean it. Do it now, however young or old you are. Do it on Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, every day.”
How I wish I had done more of it. Now it’s too late — but it’s never too early. UNQUOTE