Poor Gordon Gecko

Katherine Mangu-Ward | October 2, 2008

Biden: "you've seen what's happened on Wall Street"

Biden: "letting Wall Street run wild"

Palin: "there was greed and there is corruption on Wall Street"

Biden: "You had actually the belief that Wall Street could self-regulate itself"

Biden: "Letting Wall Street run wild"

Palin: "Stop the greed and corruption on Wall Street"

Palin: "Corruption and the greed on Wall Street"

Palin: "Get rid of the greed and corruption on Wall Street"

Palin: "We have got to not allow the greed and corruption on Wall Street anymore"

Ugh. Someone get Wall Street an ice pack.

Comments

|10.2.08 @ 11:19PM|#

KMW stands up for big business. In other news, water is wet.

Meh|10.2.08 @ 11:22PM|#

I think $700 billion in taxpayer funds can cure wall street's hurt feelings.

Kris|10.2.08 @ 11:28PM|#

Best debate comment EVER.

cunnivore|10.2.08 @ 11:35PM|#

"You had actually the belief that Wall Street could self-regulate itself"

...as opposed to self-regulating someone else.

Seriously, everyone jumps down Palin's throat for the "nuk-yu-lar" business -- even though it's a valid pronunciation according to Merriam-Webster -- yet Biden gets a pass on tripe like this because he's so darned bald and experienced.

alan|10.2.08 @ 11:36PM|#

The good thing about an old school leftist of the populist bent like Biden is that they would never give away 700 billion dollars of our money to the fat cats to prop up their worthless assets and keep their high living ways afloat.

Jerry|10.2.08 @ 11:37PM|#

I think the line about Exxon was ill-conceived too. Don't they even know how many people own XOM stock via their retirement accounts?

SIV|10.2.08 @ 11:38PM|#

Fuck Wall Street. They always come crying to Uncle Sugar or the Federal Reserve when things don't go their way. Fisk and Gould would have nothing but contempt for the current crop of pussies.

Paul|10.2.08 @ 11:42PM|#

So, mr biden, why then are you rushing to give Wall Street $700+ billion in corporate welfare, you corporatist fuck?

Oh, riiiiight, it's for my protection.

alan|10.2.08 @ 11:42PM|#

keep their high living ways afloat.

Would that pass as a Palinism? Oh, need to take the 'g' off of 'living'.

Xmas|10.2.08 @ 11:45PM|#

That explains with the Dow Jones is down 300 points right now in the futures market for tomorrow's opening.

|10.2.08 @ 11:46PM|#

I think Palin misspoke when she said that the mess on Main Street is seriously affecting Wall Street (the reverse?). Not that the statement wasn't correct, but because it didn't fit in with her phony "death to Wall Street" rhetoric.

|10.2.08 @ 11:49PM|#

Don't you understand? Wall Street is the victim here!

BDB|10.2.08 @ 11:54PM|#

I think Palin won.

|10.2.08 @ 11:55PM|#

My wife said, "her smugness is disgusting."
we both had to listen to her very close to pick out the points amongst all the referances to Obama and Biden's past(right up to where she took several swats at Joe for talking about the past so much) and all the dumb country folkisms. Gave me a headache.

I just wish her tutors would have put some substance in there somewhere.

BDB|10.2.08 @ 11:58PM|#

Swing voters, especially swing voters in October, are the dumbest people in the world. They aren't looking for substance.

|10.3.08 @ 12:05AM|#

"Swing voters, especially swing voters in October, are the dumbest people in the world. They aren't looking for substance."

They don't understand substance, and that threatens them. So you're absolutely right about that.

cunnivore|10.3.08 @ 12:15AM|#

And the moose wept.

Do moose even have tear ducts?

BDB|10.3.08 @ 12:23AM|#

This pic sums up the whole debate in a nutshell.

johnl|10.3.08 @ 12:23AM|#

Green isn't her color.

|10.3.08 @ 12:30AM|#

I for one was disappointed with the answers as to who is at fault for the present Wall Street crisis. Any answer that doesn't include the words 'Barney' and 'Frank' is incomplete.

For example... Frankly, the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street by the taxpayers is akin to Barney the purple dinosaur screwing over the children on his show.

alan|10.3.08 @ 1:26AM|#

I recall in 10th grade my English teacher, an old French lady btw, gave a brief lecture about Alice in Wonderland
being an extended analogy about the Gold Standard.

Hit it Grace:

One rate makes you larger
And one rate makes you small
And the ones that Uncle Sugar gives you
Don't do anything at all

Go ask Sarah
When she gets back from the mall.

And if you go financing mortgages
And you know you're going to fall
Tell 'em a dank weed smoking chairman
Has given you the call

Should have Recalled Sarah
When she was just small

When logic and proportion
Have fallen sloppy dead
And GWB is talking backwards
And the Red Queen Pelosi says "off with his head!"
Remember how it all began;
'In the end we owe it to ourselves
In the end we are all dead.'

|10.3.08 @ 2:15AM|#

Are you sure it wasn't the Wizard of Oz?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wonderful_Wizard_of_Oz#The_Gold_Standard_representation_of_the_story

|10.3.08 @ 4:01AM|#

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are both headquartered in DC, quite some distance from Wall Street.

Just sayin'...

-jcr

|10.3.08 @ 4:59AM|#

Wall Street would like to absord the losses from their mistakes. Bold risk taking is their business. But for the good of the nation, they have reluctantly agreed to transfer their losses to the taxpayer. Country first.

ktc2|10.3.08 @ 8:40AM|#

Personally, I'm with the guys on Wall Street carrying the "JUMP! You Fuckers!" signs.

|10.3.08 @ 8:40AM|#

"Mr. Nice Guy | October 2, 2008, 7:37pm | #

"Greed" would be another good word to drink on."

Hey, I get to toot my own horn here. Toot, Toot!

|10.3.08 @ 9:53AM|#

Lessee, if all of the home mortgage takers had lived up to their legal contractual obligations there would be no problem.

If the original lenders had lived up to their responsility to shareholders and acted as prudent stewards of the funds they managed there would be no problem.

If GSOs Freddie and Fannie had not been implicitly insured by the government they would likely not have bought up every sub-prime in sight, repackaged and sold them as MBSs.

If the investment houses had lived up to their responsibilities and carefully inspected thosee securities before purchasing them, Freddie and Fqannie would have forced to stop backing questionable lending practices much earlier and the original lenders would have stopped granting mortgages to Joe Shit the Ragman (and his dog Spot) earlier.

None of the people/organizations discussed above* are innocent of greedy shortsighted behavior. None of them deserves to be bailed out.

Instead both VP hopefuls bash the investment firms publicly while backing a measure to rescue/bailout while overpaying for their bad investments. You can be certain when all is said and done, the bailout bill will have a price tag of a terabuck or more and the mortgage defaulters (us old farts remember when it was considered shameful to default on a loan) will get assistance as well. That's because carefully considerining the biggest investment of their lives is just too damned much to ask of a free and allegedly educated public

Don't you just love bipartisanship?

* I'll give Spot a pass. I like dogs.

ed|10.3.08 @ 10:09AM|#

Once again Main Street™ is left blameless.

economist|10.3.08 @ 10:25AM|#

I think I might have a problem. I went through a whole bottle just this morning. Maybe I shouldn't read "Hit and Run" so much at this time of day. Maybe I'll read "Huffington Post". According to them, us laissez-faire types are taking over the world. THAT should cheer me up.

Red Green|10.3.08 @ 10:42AM|#

The wall,in "Wall st.", was originally built in 17something, to keep the wild pigs out of the town...ironic...walls just don't work. I understand that back then, "Main st.", was where the town butchers lived....again.

|10.3.08 @ 11:05AM|#

Didn't Gordon Gecko go to jail?

|10.3.08 @ 1:25PM|#

Greed is good. And if you need a friend, get a dog.

OtherGuy|10.3.08 @ 2:46PM|#

Gordon Gekko | October 3, 2008, 1:25pm | #
Greed is good. And if you need a friend, get a dog.

'Greed' is a an archaic Biblical expression that doesn't mean shit beyond the insufferable sanctimony of those that use the word.