All Things in Moderation

One more piece of the picture of the Obama Administration as routinely practicing all the forms of impropriety and graft of which Democrats used to accuse the Bush/Cheney Administration is this story about the WH pressuring an Air Force General to change his testimony to be more favorable to a large Democratic Party donor’s business interests.

Speaking of Ponzi schemes. [While this blog is still private, I’ll note that I was born and raised not far from there and know this community pretty well. This comes as no shock to me.–QB]

Speaking of Michael J. Fox (which we were, earlier today), do you folks know that Nike has made a limited run the Nike Mag shoes from 2015 that Marty McFly wore in Back to the Future II?

They are being auctioned off for a good cause. If you have $2000 or so to spare for a pair of shoes, you should buy some.

[What? It’s the end of the day.–KW]

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An open thread to end the day. Please use it to catch up with others and feel free to post whatever suits your fancy. Just so you know I’ll put this up tomorrow as a scheduled post and any of you “We’re all Administrators Now” can drop a link or comment in prior to posting.

Here’s my comment for tonight.

There has been much discussion of Social Security over the past several months and in particular the last few weeks. I think it’s appropriate at some point to remember why it was enacted in the first place and a quote from FDR seems appropriate.

We can never insure one hundred percent of the population against one hundred percent of the hazards and vicissitudes of life, but we have tried to frame a law which will give some measure of protection to the average citizen and to his family against the loss of a job and against poverty-ridden old age.

I hope you’re all working on conversation starting posts for tomorrow.

I put this in early tonight since no one seemed to have a post going. Come on you guys, we need commentary to comment on, lol.

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Do you ever follow links that lead to other links and then even more links, I do. Hence, I came across this piece today, an anthropological study of bankers being conducted by a Danish anthropologist. He’s even launched a blog to discuss his findings. As a matter of fact it just went live today (link to blog at the end of the article). I took a couple of anthropology courses in college and they were two of my favorite classes, probably because I preferred anything to math or biology, but still.

Here are a couple of excerpts from the piece. We probably don’t need another blog to visit but you never know.

Another banker who would talk but declined to sit for a portrait, compared his work to that of a GP: “You spend many hours memorising terms (body parts, diseases, treatments) and learning to recognise patterns. Then you put in very long hours and collect a nice salary, while employing your jargon to intimidate outsiders.”

That’s the sort of thing I’ve been talking to bankers about, and why I am beginning to be captivated by them. Beneath the layers of lingo there are subcultures and dress codes and ways of speech, their mutual stereotypes, conventions, taboos and of course jokes: “Every economist knows that there are three kinds of economists; there are those who know how to count, and there are those who don’t.”

Now for the blog. Here’s the idea. You have the internet and today’s technology. You have the classic techniques of narrative journalism and anthropological fieldwork. And you have this enormously important yet devilishly complex thing called the world of finance.

Like most anthropologists he worries he’ll get too close to his subjects but,

Still the bankers are getting under my skin. If there’s one thing that has suddenly begun to annoy me no end it is categorical statements about “the banks” or “bankers”. I have learned by now that such generalisations obscure just how different many of the activities across the financial sector are. If you are angry about “the banks”, you need to specify which parts. Otherwise you are like somebody who blames the BBC for what happened at News of the World; they are all the media, aren’t they?

And here, a discussion with a lawyer friend, after observing a room full of lawyers, he compares their dress code to that of Merger & Acquisition bankers. Funny but interesting if you believe that bankers are people too.

He then proceeded to compare this to the outfit of an M&A banker. These may dress in a very flashy way and drive very expensive cars. The reason is, they are selling companies for their clients, making these clients very rich. If an M&A banker radiates wealth and success, potential new clients will not think: am I paying too much? Potential clients will think: this guy has made other people very rich, he must be very good, I am going to hire him so he can make me very rich too.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/sep/14/bankers-anthropological-study-joris-luyendijk

The obvious conclusion of course is that none of us should demonize entire swaths of either an industry, political party or any identified group of people.

*Administrative note: I’ll be publishing an open thread this evening (not too early) so we can all discuss the days events, the Plumline (just kidding), our blog or whatever suits your fancy. I thought we’d try it and see if everyone likes it. I think I’ll call it Go To Bed (not really) unless anyone has a better idea.

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Okay, so tonight was a little chaotic. I don’t actually have any ground rules just some ideas. I’ll throw them out there and then we can all discuss them. Kevin and I thought that the first 15 to 20 plumliners could all be administrators, that way there’s someone around to monitor the site for strangers that don’t contribute to the dialogue in a meaningful way. As administrator you can edit or delete posts, but we need to decide when that would be appropriate. I’m a free speech advocate and don’t have much trouble avoiding or ignoring commenters without engaging them so I’m probably not the best person to decide. I do think we should use the privilege very judiciously and maybe give a warning or a reason first just to be honest or discuss amongst ourselves via email or something.

Second set of commenters, if we get them, could be authors and post the longer comments or diaries at the top of a thread the same way administrators can but would not be able to edit or delete other posts. We could wait and see how their comments are first if it’s someone we’re unfamiliar with and make it an invitation only deal.

I think we should all try really hard not to intrude on the Plumline and talk about our new blog too much. I know we’re trying to recruit some of the better commenters from there but we need to be careful. And for now at least, I don’t think we should ever link to our blog there. Right now it’s closed to the public but it won’t stay that way.

One last thing, the success of this blog and the enjoyment and education we receive from it depends on our willingness to begin new threads with interesting ideas and links so I hope everyone will participate. Also, AFAIC off topic is fine in any thread.

This was quick and dirty so forgive any mistakes. The floor is yours.

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Hi all

Lo and behold Kevin already had a blog up and running that we could all share, which saved me a lot of work. But this won’t be Kevin’s blog or my blog, it belongs to all of us. I’m hoping most of you will participate not only in commenting but in creating your own posts or diaries that the rest of us will comment on. I’m also hoping for an exchange of ideas, free of death threats and infantile name calling, if I can be blunt. I love a good argument and a vigorous defense of ideas and positions but sometimes the extra noise and insults get in the way of the debate. One thing I’d hate to see though is for this place turn into an echo chamber or a sterile environment that loses all personality. This is my vision and mine alone, you may have different ideas, as a matter of fact you probably do. And don’t forget the humor please.

There is a lot going on right now in the world and we’ll hopefully display many different view points and an exchange of ideas, not to mention a commenting system that’s a little more stable. I hope you’ll still participate at the Plumline and bring lots of links and commentary from other blogs and news sources here so we can discuss them. I don’t think we should link our little slice of the blogosphere elsewhere though until we decide together how open we want to be to strangers.

I haven’t had a chance to explore the site very thoroughly yet so we’ll have to do it together. You should probably direct technical questions to Kevin, lol. If you figure something out that will make this place more interesting or inviting try it out and share it with us. Have at it people.

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