Eat the Rich!

I'm going to embarrass myself with history, not my strong suit. Bear with me.
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- (see this dash here? Blogger is AGAIN refusing to recognize carriage returns. So much hate. Aren't you guys one of the smartest, best paying companies in the world? And still Google Blogger is riddled with flaws. Notice how my pictures are never centered? Good reason for that. Notice how my text isn't fully-justified? That's not by design but necessity.)
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I've never understood some revolutions. American revolution, I understand that. Revolutions where class disparity gets so bad that the poor rise up and slay the ruling class are the ones I don't understand. Redistribute the wealth? Has that ever worked? Unless you have a leader of the revolution who finds the evil landowners' treasuries and doles out an equal portion to an entire nation of people, how do you redistribute the wealth? The only thing that happens is the wealthiest get slain (usually for good reason) and the leader of the revolution and his best friends get rich.
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And then I read crap like this and I don't really care about logic.
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Companies that have gotten bailouts continue to make a mockery of taxpayers.
Until it came to light Tuesday, Wells Fargo, which received $25 billion in federal funds, was blithely planning a series of “employee recognition outings” to Las Vegas luxury hotels this month.

As ABC reported, Bank of America took its $45 billion in bailout funds and sponsored a five-day carnival outside the Super Bowl stadium, and Morgan Stanley took its $10 billion in bailout money and held a three-day conference at the Breakers in Palm Beach. (Morgan Stanley had also still planned to send top employees to Monte Carlo and the Bahamas, events just canceled.)

The New York Post revealed that Sandy Weill, former chief executive of Citigroup, took a company jet to fly his family for a Christmas holiday to a $12,000-a-night luxury resort in San José del Cabo, Mexico. No matter that the company just got a $50 billion federal bailout and laid off 53,000 worldwide.

The interior of the 18-seat jet, as described by The Post, is posh, with a full bar, fine-wine selection, $13,000 carpets, Baccarat crystal glasses, Cristofle sterling silver flatware and — my personal favorite — pillows made from Hermès scarves.

Comments

  1. JackFebruary 6, 2009 at 2:18 PM

    Exactly. Whenever my harcore conservative buddies accuse me of being a socialist . . . before I explain to them again that if they think Democrats are socialist then they're stupid . . . I still always have to preface it with, "well, that depends what's on the morning news."

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousFebruary 6, 2009 at 2:46 PM

    Marx would tell you that things get better a little bit with each revolution.

    It's just a matter of time before the bottom 90% rise up against the upper 10%.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousFebruary 6, 2009 at 3:45 PM

    I wish i could get 50 million dollers . I would have a carnival too. with a clown and some midgets doing cartwheels. did you read my post on your previous blogg?

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousFebruary 6, 2009 at 3:57 PM

    I think the class disparity in a place like the US is not nearly so great as somewhere like Haiti, for example. The bottom 90% in the US are still talking on their cel phones, posting their videos on youtube, dvr'ing their favorite shows while the rich in the US are flying in their private jets and eating filet mignon. In Haiti the bottom 90% are sitting in a mud hut and eating dirt. It's probably a lot easier to get worked up to violence against the upper class when you are watching your kids starve.

    ReplyDelete
  5. AnonymousFebruary 6, 2009 at 10:49 PM

    Agreed Chris. That was a very insightful non-US centered worldview comment.

    ReplyDelete
  6. JohnFebruary 7, 2009 at 12:05 AM

    Hey, a brothers got to eat.

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousFebruary 10, 2009 at 12:35 PM

    Hey jamie love to read you stuff
    saw you name come up here.http://www.top8magic.com/2009/02/and-the-greatest-magic-article-of-all-time-is/

    thanks Nathan Bingham aka Burn Boy

    ReplyDelete

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