Bars in New York City are where you can say things you really, actually believe, but cannot say in polite, politic or intellectually mixed company. And you can shout it out, generally over the din of surrounding customers who are trying to do pretty much the same thing.
So, whoever these NPR reporters are, they have clearly decided it would be interesting to hear what certain people, namely these Wall Street banker up and comings, think. The reporters had asked questions, apparently before I tuned in, about what these bankers think about the Obama idea of taxing the rich more than the poor. The bankers, young as they are, apparently meet the definition of rich and they are appalled they have been singled out for special treatment.
They work for banks as employees, so they do not try to voice that tired old canard so many Republican spokesmen mouth--that if you tax the billionaires and some millionaires, they will simply take their balls home and refuse to play, that is, the "job generators" the "small businessmen" who are billionaires, will will just fold their arms, pout and stop creating new jobs just to spite President Obama and all those who sail with him.
No, what these young bankers say is they deserve their wealth and nobody should take any of it away from them.
But, the reporters press on, if not for the bank bail out you'd be out of work, on some unemployment line, and not rich at all. So the government, in a very real sense, gave you your job or at the very least preserved it for you and now you're making millions in bonuses and whatnot.
No, the bankers replied, we are rich because we were smart enough to become bankers and smart to enough to stay bankers. We were smart enough to know the government would have no choice but to bail us out.
They really said that.
Then again, it is a bar, where people are liquored up, back stage and can speak the truth.
The reporters press on: But you got your jobs because you went to the right schools and got educated, some of you in public schools before you went to the Ivy League, and were it not for all that infrastructure, you could not possibly enjoy the wealth you enjoy today and look forward to in the future. And if the government giveth, does the government not have a right to taketh away?
No. The bankers laughed and started talking very slowly, as if to a very slow witted child. You see, I am smarter than other people, which is why I am rich. That is what makes it right.
But what about the bailout.
I saw it coming.
This is all redolent of that old line about the psychic who sued the CT scan people because the machine stripped her of her psychic powers when she had a CT scan of her head. But, if you were psychic, then couldn't you know, couldn't you see into the future and know that would happen? But then, again, you could also see this million dollar law suit. Same progression of thought.
It is all an echo of that old divine right of kings. Dieu et mon Droit, on the royal crest of England, which some people take quite literally as God and my right (hand) but which likely really meant, God is my right, i.e God provides me with the right to rule, to be wealthy while my subjects live in poverty.
The really curious thing is not that there are people who can rationalize this way--people will always convince themselves whatever is good for them personally is ordained by God, or is right in any number of ways.
What's really amazing is so many people sitting in mobile homes believe them. It's the "What's the Matter with Kansas?" thing. You've got people struggling, get foreclosed, watching their end of the economic ship inundated with waves washing them overboard and they look up to the bridge overhead, where the Captain is dining with rich people in dinner dress and saying, "Oh, this is as it should be. Someday, when I'm rich, I'll be happy about these rules."
Go figure.
Then again, this is a country which elected a demented man twice, and then followed that with a retarded one. Sorry, he was mentally challenged. No, sorry, he was special. All those rich people are special.
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