IMPUNITY, n.  Wealth. Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Bierce. The Devil’s Dictionary (The Peter Pauper Press 1958)
Pp 31

“The Money-changers Have Fled From The Temple Of Our Civilization:” F.D. Roosevelt Inaugural Address

“Many of the of the most sensational exposures of the Pecora investigation would come later, but by early March, 1933, enough had been revealed for the American people to recoil indignantly from the evidence of chicanery, greed and simplemindedness among the nation’s largest bankers. And the failure of the banks, which had wiped out untold millions in life savings, seemed a final indictment on the private banking system. Roosevelt himself had declared in his inaugural address that

“…the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and have abdicated… The money-changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization.”"

F.D. Roosevelt, Inaugural address, cited in Goldston. March 04, 1933.

Cited in Robert Goldston, The Great Depression: The United States In The Thirties (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968) Pp 114

Drawing by Heinrich Kley. The Drawings Of Heinrich Kley, Dover Publications Inc. (New York: 1969) pp. 92

Those Who Think Action Might Be In Order Will Be Called Men Of Little Faith: John Kenneth Galbraith

The market will not go on a speculative rampage again without some rationalization. But during any future boom some newly rediscovered virtuosity of the free enterprise system will be cited. It will be pointed out that people are justified in paying the present prices –indeed, almost any price- to have an equity position in the system. Among the first to accept those rationalizations will be some of those responsible for invoking the controls. They will say firmly that controls are not needed. The newspapers, some of them, will agree and speak harshly of those who think action might be in order. They will be called men of little faith.

John Kenneth Galbraith, The Great Crash 1929 (50th Anniversary Edition: Houghton Mifflin, New York 1979) Pp 190

“Beecher declared that men “who have been cast down from affluence to poverty should not grunt and grumble, but bear matters unflinchingly. They should never forget that they are men, even though they die of hunger. An Indian, uncivilized though he was, never flinched when fire was applied to his body. The manly way to meet misfortune is to go down boldly to poverty.” (Lyman Beecher was the Minister of the Plymouth Congregational Church in Brooklyn, and the Father of Harriet Beecher Stowe.)

Susan Jacoby: The Age of American Unreason. Random House; New York. 2008. pp. 73

We encourage you, our Reader, to go and have a look at our Definition For A New World Order: “Economy” and The Democracy,” regarding the Monstrous Reification of “The Economy.” Stealing the future is that much more reprehensible when for a generation we are sold the lie that we have an “economy” and that we have a future. We could have done something about it. This is the true hallmark of the con-man, or the insane demagogue. The delusion lasts long enough to ensure complete, irrecoverable desolation and emmiseration. “It is so much easier, so much safer politically, to simply say “You were the victim of a lie,” than to suggest that both voters and their elected representatives, in both parties, must shoulder much of the blame for their willingness to be deceived. It is easy to imagine the chorus of sneers from ignorant talking heads on cable news if a presidential candidate dared to use the word “ignorance” in public.”

Susan Jacoby: The Age of American Unreason. Random House; New York. 2008. pp. 144

When do we call this terrorism? The Kidnap. The Hostage. The Ransom. The Hijack. The Extortion. The flaming wreckage. The despoliation and ruination of innocents.

“They are Leaders.” (They have led us… where?)

“They are Experts.” (They are charlatans in phony wizard costumes.)

“They know what to do.” (They know what to do, all right. Again, and again…)

“They are skilled.” (They are skilled deceivers. They repeat the same colossal theft over and over again.) 

“They take risks. They must be compensated.” (What risk? The risk that they will take their criminal “compensation” and go to another corporation to extort criminal “compensation?” Or the “Public Sector” to steal from the “public?” The fuck they take risks.)

“It is a Competitive job market. They must be compensated commensurately, or they won’t do the job.” (“Competitive?” Like the “free markets?”)

“They are the best in the world.” (They are a unique breed, that’s for sure.)

“They won’t do it if we don’t pay them their millions upon millions.” (What the fuck do you mean, they “won’t do it?” They won’t extort hundred of millions of dollars from us if they don’t extort hundreds of millions of dollars from us? Again? They won’t hijack, plunder and utterly destroy the productive capacity of global enterprise and the livelihoods of the populace?)

“They earn it.” (They have deluded generations of us to believe that they “earn” profits from real growth of real capital in real productive activity. There are no profits. They “Keep” the (real) “Money.”)

“They bring (shareholder) value. It is they who bring value.” (“Value?” Just how do you “value” the automobile industry now? Your future financial security? Our collective national and global security? Any future ecosystemic continuity?)

“They create profit.” (They invent fictitious “profit.” Then they appropriate it and steal it. “Profits?” What profits? Where are they? Huh? Research and development? Innovation? Your retirement fund?)

“The Market establishes their value.” (“The Market.” “The Market?” The market of they and themselves? Or that there ol’ “Free Market” we’ve heard about?)

“Economic ingenuity produced all this good- and produces only good. And such good is a public good- of general and public benefit.” “If it was invented in the financial markets, it produced only profit (and not loss- or “risk”).” The catechism of Strange, Magical Beliefs: That “the value of Things is found in their Market.” That “It “worked.”” (“It” hijacked and killed any notion or residuum of any economic future for us all, and substituted a farcical tissue of invention.) That the “profits” “It” invented were money. (They still “have” the “money.”) That “It” must therefore be ingenious. (Oh, yeah. Like a hundred clever movie heists.) That “It” produces the highest and best social value. The Mystery and Magic of Neo-liberal Financial Instruments:

WE CONFLATE: fiction with “profit” with money with value and productivity and growth.

WE ADDUCE: productivity from growth.

WE ADDUCE: growth from profit.

WE ADDUCE: profit from fiction.

WE ADDUCE: that “It” works.

WE ADDUCE: That “It” is good.

WE ADDUCE: That “It” is good for all.

WE ADDUCE: That “It” is real. All Glory be to “It.” Amen. 

“There is an acute awareness that things do not find their worth just in the market valuation on a given day.”

The Nation 15 Dec. (Cite Edition and Volume) pp. 36. Thank goodness. Hey, Brother Executive, Can You Spare A Dime? Doesn’t this seem like a really stupid time to be standing there with your hand out? When everything is smashed: When the sandbox is full of excrement and putrescence and the toys are all broken: When they stand there, parroting their tired demands for extortionist lootings. Droning the old doctrines about unfettered capitalism and the freedom of the marketplace… Then, brother, they are deluded. They are deranged. They are insane.

Look around you. Look at what they have done, at what they have wrought. Have you not had enough? What further discrediting of delusional extremist fundamentalism could you possibly imagine? Could you conceivably want further evidence of this insanity? How can you… believe? Can you delude yourself that they are not responsible for this? How can they? They are lunatics. This is beyond daring and beyond careless greed. Anybody who will still stand there and tell you, True Believer, that they are magic and you should give them money, shouldn’t be trusted with their own shoes. We, the Editor, certainly don’t want you, dear Reader, to be standing anywhere near them. It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall. When everything has failed and the world is burning and the hostages are all dead… Isn’t that when we kill the terrorists? Don’t we drag them out by their hair and beat them to death with stones? Brother, doesn’t this seem like a really stupid time to be standing there with your hand out?