THEN vs NOW

OK once again let's clear things up. This recession we're going through is NOT LIKE THE GREAT DEPRESSION. AT ALL. Here are a few points to help clarify this:

"I'm hungry!"

THIS RECESSION: I think I'll go use my credit card and buy some food at the fully stocked grocery store. Excuse me are these apples organic? Helloooo? Do you even speak English?
THE GREAT DEPRESSION: Fuck you, eat your kids.

"I lost my job!"

THE GREAT DEPRESSION: I might have to move to California to find work. This dust storm sucks anyways. Pack up family! We're goin' west!
THIS RECESSION: I'm going to just hide in one of the closets in my 8 bedroom house with one of those silver emergency blankets wrapped around my head. Then months later I'll crawl out and take a less desirable job for less money but compare it to the Holocaust.

"I'm almost out of cash!"

THE GREAT DEPRESSION: Better hide this in my mattress and play the fiddle till this all passes!
THIS RECESSION: Wait, I can only afford an older generation iPod? I'd better murder my whole family!

I'm predicting that it's only a matter of time before we see a goddamn photo of some laid off businessman or woman wearing fucking OVERALLS because THAT'S ALL THEY HAVE LEFT TO WEAR. Because they're SO POOR now. However if we see one of them wearing nothing but a barrel, that person deserves a high five.

Fate worse than death!

Quotation of the day in yesterday's New York Times:

"It has been the hardest thing in my life. It has been harder than my divorce from my husband. It has really been even worse than the death of my mother."
-Ame Arlt

Holy tough economic times, batman! The absolute worst thing ever in her whole entire life! What could possibly have happened to this poor lady? Did she contract a debilitating disease? Did her children get kidnapped? No, she had to take an hourly wage job. That's it. Just a regular old job. I understand that going from a high-paying executive job to a less lucrative one is not a favorable change, but worse than the death of your mother? Really? If she had to choose between having her mother alive or having a better job, she'd choose the job? That settles it. Hourly wage jobs are, indeed, worse than death.

I looked up her mother's obitiuary. Mom died of cancer several years ago. Well, at least she never had to experience the heart-wrenching despair of the non-salaried workplace. I mean, she got off pretty easy, when you think about it. Cancer is probably like a fucking picnic compared to an hourly wage job. Except for the part where there's no picnic, and then you die.

The article mentions that this woman also used to have a tack store and equestrian magazine, which explains a lot. I know this woman. I used to work at a fancy dressage stable that was full of them. Like the one who had to import her new horse from Sweden, because Lord knows there weren't any decent horses in THIS country. Like the one who bought a $30,000 show horse for her pre-pubescent daughter, because little Betty Lou would be so upset if she didn't win ribbons at all the shows. There is still a review of Ms. Arlt's now-closed tack store online; the user describes it as having "Snooty staff, high prices, zero customer service." She says that the staff appeared to be annoyed at a commoner breathing their air.

Maybe there is justice in the world after all (but I'm still waiting for my ex to get hit by a bus before I will say I believe in karma).

You Wanna Be Mad? Harry Markopolous Is Gonna Make You F-in' Irate!

Mild mannered math nerds don't usually don't achieve folk hero status, but Harry Markopolous is a guy who deserves a Depression-era ditty written about him. For those of you who didn't see him shaking his fist and raising his voice in a congressional hearing a couple of weeks back, or missed 60 Minutes last night because you were too busy watching idiots get punched in the nuts on AFV, Harry Markopolous is the guy who started blowing the whistle on Bernie Madoff back in 2001. For eight years he duly alerted the SEC that Madoff was running a scam, and for eight years they ignored him, indtead focusing their resources on public enemy number one Martha Stewart. For all Stewart's crimes, her alleged insider trading is the least egregious. But Madoff got off. And would have kept getting off if everything remained peaches and cream in the stock market. If you didn't watch 60 Minutes, you owe it to yourself to see for yourself what a giant fuckup this was on the part of the government. Or was it a fuckup? Was the SEC in bed with Madoff? Stranger things have happened.

More Assholery

For such a so-called "liberal" paper, the New York Times is sure working overtime these days to provide the city's rich folk with a shoulder to cry on. Check out this article about a top New York City real estate agent giving up her Rolls fucking Royce in favor of - gasp! - an Audi station wagon! To look less pretentious.

"Ms. Baum said she could still afford the monthly lease — upward of $3,000 — and the high costs of repairing and garaging the car. She’s giving it up, she said, only because she has come to feel deeply uncomfortable riding around in the Rolls, spacious and well-appointed though it may be. 'I want to adjust to the times,' Ms. Baum said as she and Mr. Jaffeer stopped outside 580 Park Avenue, one of the city’s more prestigious prewar co-op buildings."

Really now, we wouldn't want mummy rolling up to Spoiled Brat Country Day in the Audi, now would we! Talk about embarrassing. Nothing says "one step away from food stamps" like having to trade down for a goddamn German engineered station wagon. Please tell me it's at least an A8 and not one of those lowly A4s, or, God forbid, an A3. Then you might as well just take your clients on the bus.