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Our F-Word Economy
I was contemplating the nauseating hypocrite Obama's latest spit-on-the-public joke about regulating the financial services industry (a 29-year-old junior executive from Goldman Sachs was appointed Chief Enforcement Officer of the SEC), and really...
What can you say?
The guy in this video plugs his favorite sock-your-money-away-in-precious-metals operation for about 30 seconds, and then...
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Say it with a baseball bat!
October 27, 2009 1:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
I'd like to get that guy in the room with Giethner and Summers and turn the music up. (hat tip to q)
October 27, 2009 1:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yup, it pisses me the fuck off, too!
(i confess i'm impressed how sturdy that fucking printer is, though...)
October 27, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
About that printer/piñata...
I kept expecting a bag of silver ingots to fly out of it.
October 27, 2009 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Taht printer: IT HAD IT COMIN'!
(Them ingots woulda been a nice touch.)
October 27, 2009 2:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wall Street never had it fuckin' better.
October 27, 2009 1:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
The man's got a point
October 27, 2009 3:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
"We're a service economy!"
October 27, 2009 4:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
So many quotable lines. :-)
And he never swings and misses.
I love that guy!
October 27, 2009 4:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
The sequels have some good moments too. He eventually busts a bat... and a blender swings round and clips him in the back of the head... but he keeps comin' with the one-liners - "$8 an hour ain't even gonna support my motherfuckin' weed habit."
While I admire the whole rage thing (and am a bit queasy on the xenophobia/racism) -- it interests me that he's dealing in gold and silver & not seeing any problem with it. You know, if he was making enough money at it, he wouldn't care that it wasn't productive, or played off the fears of others.
I mean, the guy's not stupid, he rips finance and media and politics in some detail, but in the end, he's politically dead-ended. He'll get a right-wing spokesperson, who'll whoop a batch of resentments, but things won't get fixed and his life will suck.
October 27, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
And where could that guy find a right-wing populist with a flaming anti-corporate agenda?
October 27, 2009 5:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
... or maybe he'll get signed by the Cardinals. They could have used his help in the postseason :)
October 27, 2009 7:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gasket, how do you miss a large printer? Okay, a softball here and there you might slip, but a printer?
October 27, 2009 5:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, as someone who has had really bad eyesight since 5th grade, I guess I'm easily impressed, LOL!
October 27, 2009 6:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Why am I guessing that next time we play TPM Softball, and Gasket's up, someone's gonna hurl a printer? I can imagine the play-by-play...
"Swing and a missssssssss, and that's Steeeeeerike 3. Well Des, Gasket took some good rips at that Amana Radar Range, but no better luck than with the 28 cubic foot freezer from Fridgidaire or the 48" plasma tv's from Panasonic."
October 27, 2009 6:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Okay, you guys are starting to remind me of my family. Hey, remember that time gasket picked up a piece of fuzz off the carpet and it was actually a bee? Followed by peals of laughter and tears streaming down their ruddy faces.
October 27, 2009 7:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Harharharhar!!!
A classic exchange on TPMCafe, thanks to gasket and quinn!
October 27, 2009 7:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
I don't know whether it's classic, but I do know that it's evidence you chose a perfectly cathartic video, Rootie. Thank you as always.
I think this guy has created a work of (folk) art. It's brilliantly symbolic: the music, the iconic baseball bat, the plastic Chinese imports, the unfinished room, the quasi-hip-hop clothes from WalMart, the homemade video—all of it informs and supports his rant of pure frustration and rage. He couldn't pull off his recitation of statistics as effectively without all the trappings of contemporary American life.
I never felt an emotional connection to Mark Pauline's Survival Research Labs myself, but I can relate to this guy's video. He reminds me of my brother: a big guy with a lot of rage, a lot to be pissed off about, and deadly aim.
October 28, 2009 1:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think Pauline was all about non-emotional attachment - a robot droid guy. There also seemed to be some contempt for his fans. But some of his videos/events are great fun anyway.
October 28, 2009 4:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks, D, for identifying Pauline's mixed signals.
One more thing I'll add about the symbolism in this video is that the empty room is likely meant to conjure the idea of a foreclosed house. The baseball bat (our national pastime) is the instrument of destruction of the American Dream. But what has the American Dream become anyway? At some point we traded a solid foundation for a bunch of cheap plastic. Maybe that's why he begins every video talking about silver (a foundation).
I'm also reminded of the scene in Do the Right Thing where Danny Aiello destroys a boombox with a baseball bat (just one of many American movie references to using a bat to destroy something).
Apologies for the sterile academic interpretation, but this guy knows what he is doing, and I'm impressed.
I also like this video.
After he breaks his bat he gets a 2 by 4.
At the end of that video he slaps "Financial Crisis Cards" with pictures of Geithner, Bernanke, Paulson, Obama, George (Fuckin') Bush, Chris (Fuckin') Dodd, and (Bitchass) Greenspan to what's left of a computer keyboard, strings it up, and whacks it to pieces. Then he picks up a piece from the floor and gives an extra whack to Paulson.
October 28, 2009 9:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
Umm... I donno about all that, Gasket... I just like to smash stuff.
Here. Throw me another one of those plasma tv's.
I like the way they sound when I hit 'em.
October 28, 2009 12:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, I know. I've only done that once in my life: when I quit smoking. I have to say it was incredibly gratifying, although it scared the shit out of the cats.
October 28, 2009 12:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I keep thinking about that printer; it looks like an HP. That guy should see if they want his clip for an ad? Wouldn't ya love to see that ad?
'They're gonna run the Dow to fuckin' 20,000! Wap! Shit! Wall Street's employees are in fuckin' CHINA'! Smash!
Voiceover: HP printers take a lickin'
And they fuckin' keep on tickin'!
October 27, 2009 4:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
HP Printers - pulse of the modern economy. Thwack!!!
October 28, 2009 4:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nice Nikes and Chinese-made clothing. Dude needs to listen to less Eminem.
October 27, 2009 7:12 PM | Reply | Permalink