Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : The Epic American Credit and Bond Bubble Laboratory -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChrisJP who wrote (9612)	3/7/2004 9:16:48 AM
From: Raymond Duray	Respond to of 110194

Chris, Re: What I like about you Ray is you always try to have it both ways. Actually, I like to have it a half a dozen different ways. Fried, sauteed, broiled, broasted, barbequed and baked. Wouldn't rubber chicken be boring if we could only have it one way? And when it comes to skewering over-zealous prosecutions of celebrities, I like to point out that this whole thing was wrong on several fronts. Basically, what we have in the Stewart case is an over-zealous prosecutor trying to make a name for himself, an arrogant and obviously guilty celebrity who didn't have the sense to keep her greed in check, a toxic media culture that is perfectly willing to play the celebrity scandal game for all the ratings boost it can achieve, and a stunningly mis-lead public who seeming will never get over being manipulated. Shades of the O.J. trial. While the media plays up these wholly useless stories, the real criminals in America are hauling off the nation's wealth to their off-shore tax havens and new manufacturing centers spreading across the Third World. *** What is so disappointing in reading your comments, Chris, is that you seem to willfully be disregarding the big picture. Your example about the IBM secretary is telling in that regard. Back in the 1980's they nailed an IBM secretary for leaking the news of IBM's purchase of Lotus before the information became public. Hello? Is there anybody home? The news from the 1980s was not this trifling matter about some secretary. What in the world are you spending your intellectual firepower on? Trivial pursuits? The stories of the 1980s were 1) the corruption and illegality involved in the destruction of the manufacturing industries and pensioners by "the Predator's Ball" crowd of sleazy financial manipulators. 2) the shameful episode of greed and destruction unleased when Ronald Reagan de-regulated the Savings & Loan industry. Something for which the American taxpayer has had to pick up the tab to the tune of well over $500 Billion so far. And the real criminals, like George Bush's brother Neil Bush, walked away with millions, and left the taxpayer holding the empty bag. 3) the merger craze of the '80s produced the memorable battle for Nabisco, among other episodes of pure greed by the crony capitalist class of that era. Somehow, the IBM secretary story seems to be way, way, way down the list of real business stories from that era. I'm impressed by your comprehensive recollection of trivia. But I daresay I find the argument specious and merely a "straw man" distraction. As they say, thanks for memories..... :) All the best, Ray