Wall Street to OWS - Get A Job!

Occupy Wall Street marked its one year anniversary today.  In the intervening period, the only thing the whores on Wall Street have learned is that business as usual is perfectly acceptable and there are no repercussions for their ongoing greed and malfeasance.  To them it's as if 2008 and the massive bailouts never even happened.

Just today, "Money Honey" Maria Bartiromo from CNBS, in her role as Wall Street Mouthpiece tells Occupy Wall Streeters, to just get a job already.  I apologize for the advertisement - someone has to pay for the rivers of bullshit emanating from that station...

Below is my take on her keen "observations"  (Mac10 is my alias):

"...a year ago just a few blocks away. All to protest what they call income inequality and what they describe as corporate greed..."

Mac10: They being the human race outside of Wall Street

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"...one year later after hundreds of arrests, property destruction,sleeping on the streets let's tally up what has been accomplished by the movement - not much...."

Mac10:  That's right, nothing has changed.  It's business as usual.  Apparently the powers that be, never got the message, so we just have to try harder this next time.  In the meantime, bear in mind, that when real change does come to town, no one will be listening to your screeching bullshit.

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"my suggestion was to try and get a job..." 

Mac10:  Wow.  You like it rough huh?   Well suffice to say that not everyone can make a living lying on their back, honey muff...

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"...if this movement has a problem with business go to washington and get the laws changed...."

Mac10: Let's see - if you don't like laws created in Washington as quid pro quo for having their campaigns financed by Wall Street, then go to Washington to get those laws changed?  Am I getting that right? 

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"even though occupy wall street seemed to have galvinized thousands to protest the movement's numbers have been steadily declining" 

  Mac10:  That's right, everyone went out to get jobs, but couldn't find any, because the greedy pricks that you have as guests on your show, outsourced all the jobs.  Meanwhile, last year was just a warm-up, because when the movement really gets rolling, membership will be numbered in the millions, not the thousands.

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"...it is worth mentioning one other thing as occupy wall streeters have been protesting, the financial index is up 29%.  It's clear that if banks were all the things occupy wall street accused them of being those stocks would not be soaring"

Mac10:  ?  Where to begin...Let's see, nothing has changed, therefore financial stocks are still making obscene profits...BUT, if Wall Street Banks were in fact truly greedy, then those higher profits should translate into lower stock prices?   Well at least that puts to rest any debate as to why she works at CNBS (i.e. it's not for her investing acumen).

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And here is the most egregious video of all.  Interactive Brokers made a commercial advertising their trading platform, by mocking the OWS protests...

In a Nutshell

Here is a guy telling it like it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koY6kXhQDQo&feature=player_embedded

This gent raises some good points around who did and did not benefit from this ongoing fiasco.  Apologists for the status quo (ardent crony capitalists, CNBS infotainers etc.) tell us that homeowners are equally responsible for having leveraged their homes to the maximum and otherwise taken too much risk.

All along these same jackass disinformers have been extolling the virtues of the (supply side) capitalist model based on incentives.  So I find it a tad hypocritical to blame homeowners for taking advantage of cheap and abundantly available credit which at the height of things was shoved down their throats 24x7.  No sooner did they respond to these "incentives" than the entire scheme started unravelling.  In any other market, we are told that it is normal behaviour for consumers to respond to low prices by increasing their consumption i.e. the demand curve.   Yet, in the case of capital demand, when the price (interest rate) was lowered substantially, we are told that households were foolish for having consumed more debt !  Is the average household now supposed to be a macroeconomic forecaster, able to predict the overall trend in housing prices and interest rates?  Meanwhile, I have no doubt that the average economist has lost money via stocks or real estate during this fiasco.

Gut check.  Let's review the distribution of impacts so far:

1) Government/Regulators:
Role in fiasco:
-Failure to regulate
-Easing of regulations to accomodate banksters (Glass Steagall repeal)
-Overlooking ongoing deficits and trade imbalances
Retribution: None - business as usual

2) Banksters:
Role in fiasco: 
-Extension of credit to those who could not afford it;
-Outright fraud while securitizing  garbage loans;
-Over-leveraging of banks
-Insider Trading on a pervasive scale
-Collapsed investment funds, leaving investors holding the bag
-Leading entire economy to brink of disaster
Retribution:
- Massive $10 trillion+ Industry bail out courtesy of Turbo Flat Tax
- Massive bonuses before, during ("retention" bonuses), and after crisis
i.e. business as usual

3) Federal Reserve:

Role in fiasco:  

-Lowered interest rates to engineer bogus "recovery" and create incentives for households to borrow way beyond their means; 

-Provide leverage to speculators, under-regulate banks 

-Turn blind eye to securitization frauds; 

-Allow banks to become "too big to fail", requiring massive taxpayer bailouts

Retribution: None.  No oversight whatsoever; now via Quantitative Easing finding new ways to increase systemic leverage

4) "Irresponsible" households:
Role in fiasco:  Overconsumption, overleverage on housing and other forms of debt
Retribution:
- Foreclosure/loss of personal residence
- Bankruptcy (divorce)
- Fund taxpayer bailout of banksters
- Top Ramen for Christmas dinner


Is this a great fucking system or what?