Spintastic

I woke up this morning and turned on the news. The top story was about SEC officials getting caught for watching a lot of porn while at the office. I don't know how many people were watching porn and what kind of porn it was or any of those details, but what the newsman said after reporting that story made me uneasy.

"Maybe if these officials weren't watching pornography they would have caught the economic meltdown."

What? Really? Is that how it works. I realise the SEC is a government watchdog, whatever the fuck that really means, and the media is supposed to keep the public informed, but is that the story you want to sell me? Goldman Sachs is being charged with fraud by the United States of America. Goldman Sachs defrauded the American people. They also turned in record profits. Our financial regulations as kaput. The entire system allows for people to skim money off the top without adding any real value to the markets, so much so that we fell into recession and won't recover for a while. Hooray for 1% industrial growth (ie recovery, I know, John, steady state economics...).

I still think it is insane. We report on big bad (lawyers and economists), over paid (doubt it) government officials who watch porn at work (I think that it is inappropriate, I mean they should be working at work) and blame them for the failure of the economy. Silly. Ludicrous. Ah, but perhaps now we have a single point to blame. It was not a stream of fuck ups. No, no, it was not derivatives and deregulation and speculation on the housing market and giving out huge loans for million dollar houses to people who made less than 40K a year and some specious business practices. Nope. It was SEC government workers who could have prevented the collapse, who could have saved us from the housing bubble if they were not watching porn.

I am so glad we solved this one.