Guest Post: A Christmas Message From America's Rich
From Matt Taibbi
A Christmas Message From America's Rich
It seems America’s bankers are tired of all the abuse. They’ve decided to speak out.
True, they’re doing it from behind the ropeline, in front of friendly crowds at industry conferences and country clubs, meaning they don’t have to look the rest of America in the eye when they call us all imbeciles and complain that they shouldn’t have to apologize for being so successful.
But while they haven’t yet deigned to talk to protesting America face to face, they are willing to scribble out some complaints on notes and send them downstairs on silver trays. Courtesy of a remarkable story by Max Abelson at Bloomberg, we now get to hear some of those choice comments.
Home Depot co-founder Bernard Marcus, for instance, is not worried about OWS:
“Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” Marcus said. “Are you kidding me?”
Former New York gurbernatorial candidate Tom Golisano, the billionaire owner of the billing firm Paychex, offered his wisdom while his half-his-age tennis champion girlfriend hung on his arm:
“If I hear a politician use the term ‘paying your fair share’ one more time, I’m going to vomit,” said Golisano, who turned 70 last month, celebrating the birthday with girlfriend Monica Seles, the former tennis star who won nine Grand Slam singles titles.
Then there’s Leon Cooperman, the former chief of Goldman Sachs’s money-management unit, who said he was urged to speak out by his fellow golfers. His message was a version of Wall Street’s increasingly popular If-you-people-want-a-job, then-you’ll-shut-the-fuck-up rhetorical line:
Cooperman, 68, said in an interview that he can’t walk through the dining room of St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida, without being thanked for speaking up. At least four people expressed their gratitude on Dec. 5 while he was eating an egg-white omelet, he said.
“You’ll get more out of me,” the billionaire said, “if you treat me with respect.”
Finally, there is this from Blackstone CEO Steven Schwartzman:
Asked if he were willing to pay more taxes in a Nov. 30 interview with Bloomberg Television, Blackstone Group LP CEO Stephen Schwarzman spoke about lower-income U.S. families who pay no income tax.
“You have to have skin in the game,” said Schwarzman, 64. “I’m not saying how much people should do. But we should all be part of the system.”
There are obviously a great many things that one could say about this remarkable collection of quotes. One could even, if one wanted, simply savor them alone, without commentary, like lumps of fresh caviar, or raw oysters.
But out of Abelson’s collection of doleful woe-is-us complaints from the offended rich, the one that deserves the most attention is Schwarzman’s line about lower-income folks lacking “skin in the game.” This incredible statement gets right to the heart of why these people suck.
Why? It's not because Schwarzman is factually wrong about lower-income people having no “skin in the game,” ignoring the fact that everyone pays sales taxes, and most everyone pays payroll taxes, and of course there are property taxes for even the lowliest subprime mortgage holders, and so on.
It’s not even because Schwarzman probably himself pays close to zero in income tax – as a private equity chief, he doesn’t pay income tax but tax on carried interest, which carries a maximum 15% tax rate, half the rate of a New York City firefighter.
The real issue has to do with the context of Schwarzman’s quote. The Blackstone billionaire, remember, is one of the more uniquely abhorrent, self-congratulating jerks in the entire world – a man who famously symbolized the excesses of the crisis era when, just as the rest of America was heading into a recession, he threw himself a $5 million birthday party, featuring private performances by Rod Stewart and Patti Labelle, to celebrate an IPO that made him $677 million in a matter of days (within a year, incidentally, the investors who bought that stock would lose three-fourths of their investments).
So that IPO birthday boy is now standing up and insisting, with a straight face, that America’s problem is that compared to taxpaying billionaires like himself, poor people are not invested enough in our society’s future. Apparently, we’d all be in much better shape if the poor were as motivated as Steven Schwarzman is to make America a better place.
But it seems to me that if you’re broke enough that you’re not paying any income tax, you’ve got nothing but skin in the game. You've got it all riding on how well America works.
You can’t afford private security: you need to depend on the police. You can’t afford private health care: Medicare is all you have. You get arrested, you’re not hiring Davis, Polk to get you out of jail: you rely on a public defender to negotiate a court system you'd better pray deals with everyone from the same deck. And you can’t hire landscapers to manicure your lawn and trim your trees: you need the garbage man to come on time and you need the city to patch the potholes in your street.
And in the bigger picture, of course, you need the state and the private sector both to be functioning well enough to provide you with regular work, and a safe place to raise your children, and clean water and clean air.
The entire ethos of modern Wall Street, on the other hand, is complete indifference to all of these matters. The very rich on today’s Wall Street are now so rich that they buy their own social infrastructure. They hire private security, they live on gated mansions on islands and other tax havens, and most notably, they buy their own justice and their own government.
An ordinary person who has a problem that needs fixing puts a letter in the mail to his congressman and sends it to stand in a line in some DC mailroom with thousands of others, waiting for a response.
But citizens of the stateless archipelago where people like Schwarzman live spend millions a year lobbying and donating to political campaigns so that they can jump the line. They don’t need to make sure the government is fulfilling its customer-service obligations, because they buy special access to the government, and get the special service and the metaphorical comped bottle of VIP-room Cristal afforded to select customers.
Want to lower the capital reserve requirements for investment banks? Then-Goldman CEO Hank Paulson takes a meeting with SEC chief Bill Donaldson, and gets it done. Want to kill an attempt to erase the carried interest tax break? Guys like Schwarzman, and Apollo’s Leon Black, and Carlyle’s David Rubenstein, they just show up in Washington at Max Baucus’s doorstep, and they get it killed.
Some of these people take that VIP-room idea a step further. J.P. Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon – the man the New York Times once called “Obama’s favorite banker” – had an excellent method of guaranteeing that the Federal Reserve system’s doors would always be open to him. What he did was, he served as the Chairman of the Board of the New York Fed.
And in 2008, in that moonlighting capacity, he orchestrated a deal in which the Fed provided $29 billion in assistance to help his own bank, Chase, buy up the teetering investment firm Bear Stearns. You read that right: Jamie Dimon helped give himself a bailout. Who needs to worry about good government, when you are the government?
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Hug the root Rich Bitchez!!!
they already did this on video a while back
http://occupymoney.org/wall-streets-one-percent-responds-to-occupy/
Blame the Baby-Boomers for all the ongoing disgraces of this country, that's why they are considered America's failed generation. These good-for-nothing invested their deprived intellect in experimenting with all types of drugs and having very promiscuous (and many times deviant/unnatural) sexual lives.
In fact, the following video taken at Woodstock in 1969 clearly depicts what Baby-Boomers were all about:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLDalZ4-53g
Consequently, their offspring are the best evidence that defect genes have been transmitted from one generation to the next; worst of all, the chances that their descendants' DNA carrying a more complex sequence of these defective genes are 100% guarantee -these new generation of Americans can fairly be described as subhumans.
wankbot !
by the way, i think marcus said "imbeciles", since OWS is not one person.
It is really, really hilarious hearing those who exist in the top 1% of the world and the top 1/100000th of historical humanity complain because they can't get to that extra 1% who are the obviously greedy ones.
The very rich should enjoy themselves as much as they can - right now - for it will not be long before their skulls will be crushed with every single available instrument in the land.
If you do not believe so, you have zero clue about anything you have ever read on zerohedge.
Any man, who seriously believes he is millions and billions worth more than another human being - and - that he actually earned his millions of fiat $$, is not just a non-intellectual and a moron, but amoral, and deserves every single harsh word and physical suffering and eternity in hell - and this time around, he will get it all that.
I know every ego-loving, arrogant and supremacy seeking reader will vehemently disagree, because he too wants to be rich, to make up for his small penis, small heart and small brain. Make my day. Get worked up. The more worked up you get he more satisfying it will be to kill you when total chaos and civil war comes to town. And it will. And every money-and-ego-loving shell cocksucker will be put to the test: how much of a man are you really... - when you can't hide behind the FED, your bankster buddies, CIA, your local police, the National Guard and US Military...?
To imagine than one "creates" any value, by credit leverage &, lies, out-sourcing and off-shoring, tax evasion and operating every single major US corporation as a bank - and that the thereby established expectations is the only effective motivational device to get the poor masses to get up in the morning, go to work, keep the speed limits, pay taxes and buy consumer junk pushed by Madison Ave & Hollywood - and that these contributions are the gift of the rich to the masses... one has to be morally and intellectually depraved.
The rich - can give it all back if they wish - and since they mostly don't - they can rot in hell.Mankind does not need them at all. They delude themselves with self-flatter. They are financial terrorists. That's all.
Anyone who cements hierachy has mmore than harsh words coming. Bullets, Bitchez - Will Fly!
Yes for sure.
The obese will put down their krispy kremes,
the academics will put down their lattes all to revolt.
When they are done dividing the $12trillion in wealth the top 1% control,
they will give out $4000 to each and every citizen and all will be well again.
The very rich are afterall Darwinists. That's their self-given pat on the back. They've survived better than you, than most. They've crushed you. They've won. You've lost. They know you're pissed. But again, Darwinists could give a shit. What's important to them is that you understand you can't win the game. You're way out of your league. Because in fact you're not even part of the game. You're just onlookers. Watch them play. Envy them because that's all you got. And that's what they feed on.
Same as it ever was when you really think about it. Human-fucked-up-nature hasn't changed. Doesn't look like it will on its own either. Where all this goes is anyone's guess. But I do know that there's more pissed-off people on this planet than ever before. The masses, the hoardes, against the noblemen. Billions this time, though. It's gonna be a show and one-shit load of tell.
Missing a zero: the amount is ~$40k.
You must be a Professional "Stereotyper".
cool vid, shame i was born 20 years too late
Blaming Santana's "Soul Sacrifice" at Woodstock for the problems we face? That was an awesome performance. By the way, if you simplistically blame the Woodstock generation of Babyboomers, then you are obviously a superficial asshole. Fuck off.
Where the fuck did you come from?
wanklord is either a psy-op or someone with big problems.
You are an absolute POS and the best possible proof the retroactive abortions should be legal.
Heeeyyy .. wanklord's spot on. We were the coolest of cool generations. Everything happened on our watch. There's nothing we didn't seriously CF. We rock! Not like our short haired, well behaved serious kids. Dunno what's got into 'em. [anyway, that's not Woodstock. It's phonecam from 2008 GS chrissy party]
Wank off you are a complete fucking idiot as usual.
http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showthread.php?t=1255027
wanklord is famous, kind of.
Bingo! It was blow jobs and mary jane that fucked up this country. What a moron!
Bloody Wanker! Spend any time in Vietnam with hundreds of thousands of useless baby boomers did you? Work in America's factories in the 60-70s did you, know all about the steel mills, car factories, paper mills, texrtile mills, mines and logging operations? Sure, you know all about Woodstock, and not a friggen thing about the real world that generation fought and worked in. Wanker? Yep, Lord of the Wankers! Know what a wanker is?
"A jack off"! fits your thoughts perfectly! Go piss up a rope and take your thoughts iwth you wanklord.
Blame the Republicans. This video shows the highest levels of Republican leadership has been involved in pedophilia which they tried to cover up: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=866739408240639313
Here's non-video evidence: http://www.republicanoffenders.com/Pedophiles.html
Gee, it's always fun casting a wide net against people you don't like and blaming them for everything. You should try it sometime Wanklord...oh wait...you already did. Are you in the video by chance?
Consequently, their offspring are the best evidence that defect genes have been transmitted from one generation to the next ... these new generation of Americans can fairly be described as subhumans.
Speaking of yourself I suppose?
But I agree, Woodstock hippies run America now.
Grandpa Simpson, shouldn't you be shouting at clouds or something? Better go check your Depends and go back to sleep.
Is that the best you can do you little gen-x dipshit?
How's life there in the basement?
Frankly, I blame you.
My thoughts EXACTLY! The Boomers pretty much shove any semblance of morals out the window, and we succesive generations have to clean up their piles of shit that they left strewn behind. The Boomers gave us so much, like disco, divorce(s), step-this-and-that, mainstream drug use, whoring, single-mothering......I could go on and on and on. And they did this after being given more than any generation in history. FUCK OFF BOOMERS.....and PLEASE DIE SOON.
I'm not young enough to know everything. J.M. Barrie (often attributed to Oscar Wilde)
That 'Greatest Generation' sent my generation off to Vietnam. 'Dick' Nixon was in the 'Greatest Generation'.
That 'Greatest Generation' did a good job of screwing over the boomers.
The "Greatest Generation" (highest level of programming) gave us the CIA and the massive military machine (large-scale States are ALWAYS about LARGE militaries).
So, just which group best represents freedom?
FYI (all) - when the ONLY GAME is based on a fucking Ponzi scheme (perpetual growth on a finite planet) it's a bit silly to be talking about any group of players being responsible for the inevitable outcome.
Anyone responding to wanklord is wasting their time. He doesn't even read the articles that he "comments" on, so you can be sure he doesn't read responses to his "comments".
Wanklord is a copy-and-paste butthole. He posted the exact same word-for-word "comment" on yesterday's article about US debt breaking the 100% GDP level.
The best way to observe wanklord's patterns is a simple google search. Just for fun, try a search for the following (include the quotes so your search is for the exact phrase):
"deprived intellect in experimenting"
If wanklord is a paid shill, someone is getting ripped off.
<--- Kill the fuckers and this troll
<--- It's the hippies fault
And btw I fucking dare to say this fucking bullshit to my face you fucking coward. You fucking neocon objectivist needledick game theory spewing waste of fucking space. I fucking dare you..
None dare call it conspiracy!
Greenbackers! These are the people who think government itself should just print, because if it is fully centralized, outside of the private banking industry, then it will work!
In other words, imbeciles. Imbeciles who don't even know what the Bank of England is, yet they're sure it's the solution.
http://occupymoney.org/about/
Luckily, just today, Gary North posted an article that destroys their arguments.
http://lewrockwell.com/north/north1075.html
Comments from behind the rope line... I wonder if bullets can travel past rope lines.
The rope line for these bastards will take on a new meaning.
Bullets from where? You little OWS types?
Dream on.
There won't be any bullets ...except maybe cops gunning you little farts down.
...and they'd be doing the rest of us a favor.
So, guess you're in favor of whatever the OWS is protesting against -- check yer premises, your logic is flawed.
well, when we will reach the treshold they all will be sorry.
We are getting there.
Someday this war is going to end.
...meanwhile the napalm smell is wonderful. The horror, the horror..
Dimon's minions are trying to screw me through MF Global.
back off jamie!
Cut off the pecker, quick...
Hang in there.
What do you think about these upskirts of Monica Seles?
http://www.wtnphotos.com/data/509/Monica_Seles.jpg
Is she a pig or do I need new glasses?
Those granny pants are hot. Alas, like most European girls, she probably waxes Brazilian, but doesn't shave her pits.
The guy has billions and this is the best he can do? All I can say is that the ass matches the face. Just pathetic.
she's 'hotter' than Monica Lewinsky
what comes around goes around, time is the only variable
So, who'll be taking this weekend's shift for sniping billionaire jerkoffs at the country club?
I love it, the we'll-do-more-when-you-respect-us line. Forget the guillotine, let's go for the drawing and quartering, or perhaps more like the Cossack 4 horses tied to each appendage kind of a thing.
After the plunge in 2008 we saw a number of billionaires die under some interesting circumstances. Perhaps 2012 will have some of those televised.
Actually a fund to generously compensate the family of any would be snipers would be a thoughtfull gesture. Rewarding the sniper isn't right, in fact it's illegal, and doesn't get you the most motivated individuals anyway.
The threat of "Revolutionary Politics" is very real, and has a lot to do with why all the governments are so dead-set against a free Internet and functional digital cash.
There's an interesting essay with that title if you can find it. Well worth the read.
Even here in the suburban sprawl of Colorado I see a half dozen wifi nodes ready to mesh up ... I have a hunch said government thinks we're not far from internet 2.0 going live.
Zillions of hits on "Revolutionary Politics" including .com and .tv, if you have a link I'd be grateful.
Sorry about that, I got the title wrong, it's been quite awhile.
Keep in mind, this is the sort of stuff terrorists read. I think Jim Bell did some time.
http://www.outpost-of-freedom.com/jimbellap.htm
FU Bernard Marcus, me and my family are boycotting Home Depot effective today. FU.
I think I'll join you on that. I heard that dickhead yucking it up with Slow Joe and the Skwalk Box crew a few weeks back. I had no idea that Home Depot was run by such a repulsive dickhead. I'm through with that store. And I'm gonna tell everyone I know.
I caught that whine/brag fest too. Arrogant pricks. Sent feedback to CNBC (as if it matters). I'm glad there are lots of alternatives to HD.
Home Depot ISN'T run by Bernard Marcus OR co-founder Arthur Blank. They both retired in 2002 and 2001 respectively. Boycotting Home Depot wouldn't hurt their wallets. As a former retail worker, I'd like to point out that when store sales drop THE FIRST people to feel the effect are the lowest workers, who GET THEIR HOURS CUT IMMEDIATELY. It's hard enough to make it on a retail wage, please don't make it harder. Picket country clubs instead!
you're a retarded sheeple...keep feeding at the trough of the largest coporations in the world???
Do you have brain, probably not which is why you 'worked' in retail...were you a geatful greeter at walmart?
Hey man, you can believe that your purchases make some kind of difference in the business world all you want. I think its pretty well proved on ZeroHedge that the rich make their money by trading stocks and other bullshit like taking their company public and selling shares to suckers at the right times. If you boycott any store today, all your doing is taking away a very underpaid person's money. If they get hurt hard enough by boycotting they just shut down the store and focus elsewhere. If the workers try to unionize, they just shut down the store and focus elsewhere. Theres no winning against big business at a local level. Just think of it this way. You're not supporting Chinese factory workers, you're supporting American retail workers. I'm sorry everyone in retail can't work whatever important job you do, but to be clear WHEN I worked at a retail store (not Walmart), I busted my ass unloading semi trucks by hand overnight. Not easy work.
In construction for many years, i find the quiet of my home depots in a 4 state area both spooky and surreal, how they have managed to remain afloat with ghost traffic is baffling, perhaps large city depots are keeping the town depots alive?
Dont believe me, go and check out a depot on a monday morning,
5 retired teachers shopping for towel rods and a door hinge, 4 local handy andy's, ghost towns!
That's a very good idea. Fuck him. No more Home Cheapo for me. Everyone should get on baord that one. What a collossal asshole. Outrageous the shit these villainous thugs are spouting.
I am building a house right now. No Home Depot for me.
Who is the imbecile?
Right on. Me too and I'm a carpenter.
I've always hated home depot, in the day we'd call the lumber yard place an order and stay with the job working. The lumber yard would deliver, home depot ruined good businesses, businesses rooted within a community. I am a carpenter, god I hate that place, all the wood they sell is crap
With you 100%. Just sent a check to pay off the HD credit card and called them to cancel my account. And, maybe it's time that people understand what products keep the Koch brothers alive. Start by not buying Bounty paper towels. Then do a little more research and - just say no way.
Boycotts are a powertool, I quit watching CNN and the MSM years ago, your cable company knows what you are Clicking on methinks, let them know the insult is grevious, vote with your dollar too.No newspaper lefty crap in my house or Chinese shit either, necessity purchases only, enough gas and oil to get where i'm going and lots of friends thinking the way I do,
Create delays for the enemy, and expences, at every possible opportunity.
“Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” Marcus said. “Are you kidding me?”
When taxpayers stop paying their taxes and paying the wages of your State Police protection racket and Judiciary come back with that same line then
Blackstone CEO Steven Schwartzman: “I’m not saying how much people should do. But we should all be part of the system.”
That'll be the monopoly money system which Blackstone does so well out of ingratiating itself with The Fed. Schwartzman will of course be the first to call for a free competitive market and break-up of the century old corrupt monopoly system and the fraud money ...where competitive ability and brains shines through rather than ingratiated corruption (the 'system' where Schwartzman has shined)
Do you get the feeling that these dudes are not the sharpest tools in the shed? Cuz I certainly do.
But you are one dull chisel! or chisler.
And this right here pretty much paints the hypocrisy of it all!
It's funny how they can "inspire" others to work their assess off so that they can be just like Them! Sick and twisted... But, as they say, that which cannot last forever won't!
Sociopaths, the lot of them...
The fall from the top takes longer than when you're already at the bottom, and it hurts a lot more.
This time we don't even get cake. :(
Which is the reason you store beans, bullets, and bullion.
Let Benny Eat FRN's
Eat yer damned peas!
...
My dead lords
I confess an uneasiness in my love for you,
Confusion in my passion.
...
When your rotten skin grew hard
It fed your minion crows,
My black shining brothers
My dead lords
Oh my dead lords
I confess...
My anger gives me strength my lords.
I kissed your hard crusted rotten skin.
My uneasiness it grows
But you my Morton lords
Live on in my anger
Like the sun
...
St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida?
Check.
I would not eat the cream of mushroom soup.
The only place I eat out is Waffle House. I can watch them as they cook my food.
Or the lobster bisque. Somebody just needs to translate this article into Spanish for the following to happen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzknhw82WKs
"Can't go when you're watching."
Something tells me he and his friends will be getting much, much more than respect.
Isn't there a Fight Club in Florida?
HH -- best post of the evening.
Satisfying indeed, picturing this piece of odious plutocratic excrescence savoring his "potage a la creme."
"St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida?
Check.
I would not eat the cream of mushroom soup."
It is not a cream of mushroom soup but instead a "Cream of sum yung guy"
And Leon Cooperman loves his cream of sum yung guy real thick and moist!
LMFAO
Perhaps this is an apocryphal tale, but I read somewhere that one of the tactics of OWS was to get hired by the outlets that do lunch delivery to Goldman, JPM, et al and add that "special something" to the order. I just post this in the public interest, and for those at 85 Broad, 200 West, etc. who may be reading Zerohedge as they eat their lunches.
The actor Christopher Walken has always refused to eat in restaurants because of this sort of fear.
Hadn't heard this one but it's brilliant! Now instead of adding something just nasty how about something more - uh - effective. Oops - that would be terrorism. Never mind.
And, from the St. Andrews site, these elaborate security provisions:
"St. Andrews has taken home and community security to the "Best of the Best" levels. From the magnificent manned and gated entryway, to the on-site Medical Response Team, we provide security St. Andrews Style. 24-hour armed foot patrols are accompanied by guard dogs and a state-of-the-art 24-hour infrared perimeter system alerts the security force of any intrusion onto the grounds. Every home is monitored around the clock offering unparalleled safety, security and peace-of-mind."
Peace-of-mind, indeed.
They've built themselves a private FEMA camp.
they make nice fat targets when they venture forth into the real world...patience is a virtue.
Poor Monica Seles, she never got over that stabbing, obviously. Well, she obviously isn't poor in the terms of the cash, but as she has enough of her own, whta the hell is she doing with a 70 years old fargin icehole?
Keeping her serving skills sharp.
Damn, that Viagra shit must work gooood!