Why are people trying to make excuses for reckless gamblers whose ignorance and naked greed have created 2 asset price bubbles within a decade, and then when they face the consequences of their stupidity and avarice, try to hijack the political system and media to gain sympathy and then use violent force and extortion to compel the rest of society (the poor and those who invest/save responsibly) to bail them out?
What happened to personal responsibility, informing oneself, taking the consequences of one's own actions? How can it be morally acceptable to forcibly tax others to pay for their losses when they would have taken 100% of the upside if the bull market had continued?
These parasites helped to make stocks and then real estate unaffordable for everyone else for a decade, and destabilized and distorted the economy through their reckless uninformed risk-taking. They are in the process of ushering in a period of socialism and stagnation, and are burdening their children and grandchildren with record levels of debt to pay down. They are self-serving and immoral - they are not victims, they are victimising others.
If any hedge fund took insane risks with borrowed money, and the fund manager overstretched with a huge mortgage on a house he couldn't afford, then blew up, the typical middle class person would laugh and say "see, that's what you get for being greedy". If the manager started moaning how he couldn't retire in the style to which he was accustomed, he would be treated with derision. If he tried to deny that his reckless gambling had inflated 2 distorting and damaging economic bubbles, helping to contribute to the worst recession in 75 years, he would be harangued and insulted. If the fallen hedge fund manager then tried to lobby the political system for bailouts, there would be outrage. If the fund manager then proposed doubling the national debt and imposing swingeing tax increases for the next 10-20 years so he could be made whole, lynch mobs would start to form outside his house. If he succeeded in his lobbying and turned the government into a socialist mess, it would spark a revolution.
Yet somehow when the middle class en masse do exactly the same thing, not only is there little or no criticism, but society bends over backwards to sympathise with and accommodate them. The political system start sucking up to their demands. The media run sympathetic profiles of them. The man and woman in the street agrees with them.
If they had taken their losses on the chin, like a poker pro who moves all in on a bluff and gets called, then I could at least respect their integrity and personal accountability. I would have thought them a bit dumb for taking such risks unknowingly, and a bit irresponsible for distorting the economy by purchasing wildly overvalued assets using huge leverage. But I could at least respect them. But their whining, their loser mentality of "not my fault", I can't have anything but contempt for that. Worst of all is their attempts to pass the consequences on to others. What happened to "the buck stops here"? At this point they go from dumb whiners to immoral looters.
If this is the western middle class, the supposedly educated, hard-working, responsible part of society and even the world, then it's not anything I want to be associated with. My recommendation is fuck this society and just look out for yourself. I'll be damned if I spend one more year paying taxes through the nose to support these thieving hypocritical scum.
What happened to personal responsibility, informing oneself, taking the consequences of one's own actions? How can it be morally acceptable to forcibly tax others to pay for their losses when they would have taken 100% of the upside if the bull market had continued?
These parasites helped to make stocks and then real estate unaffordable for everyone else for a decade, and destabilized and distorted the economy through their reckless uninformed risk-taking. They are in the process of ushering in a period of socialism and stagnation, and are burdening their children and grandchildren with record levels of debt to pay down. They are self-serving and immoral - they are not victims, they are victimising others.
If any hedge fund took insane risks with borrowed money, and the fund manager overstretched with a huge mortgage on a house he couldn't afford, then blew up, the typical middle class person would laugh and say "see, that's what you get for being greedy". If the manager started moaning how he couldn't retire in the style to which he was accustomed, he would be treated with derision. If he tried to deny that his reckless gambling had inflated 2 distorting and damaging economic bubbles, helping to contribute to the worst recession in 75 years, he would be harangued and insulted. If the fallen hedge fund manager then tried to lobby the political system for bailouts, there would be outrage. If the fund manager then proposed doubling the national debt and imposing swingeing tax increases for the next 10-20 years so he could be made whole, lynch mobs would start to form outside his house. If he succeeded in his lobbying and turned the government into a socialist mess, it would spark a revolution.
Yet somehow when the middle class en masse do exactly the same thing, not only is there little or no criticism, but society bends over backwards to sympathise with and accommodate them. The political system start sucking up to their demands. The media run sympathetic profiles of them. The man and woman in the street agrees with them.
If they had taken their losses on the chin, like a poker pro who moves all in on a bluff and gets called, then I could at least respect their integrity and personal accountability. I would have thought them a bit dumb for taking such risks unknowingly, and a bit irresponsible for distorting the economy by purchasing wildly overvalued assets using huge leverage. But I could at least respect them. But their whining, their loser mentality of "not my fault", I can't have anything but contempt for that. Worst of all is their attempts to pass the consequences on to others. What happened to "the buck stops here"? At this point they go from dumb whiners to immoral looters.
If this is the western middle class, the supposedly educated, hard-working, responsible part of society and even the world, then it's not anything I want to be associated with. My recommendation is fuck this society and just look out for yourself. I'll be damned if I spend one more year paying taxes through the nose to support these thieving hypocritical scum.