It seems like we might want something new to talk about, and I think I’ll follow John’s advice and focus on something other than the miseries of the day.
So how about this:
Donald Trump has a problem with bankers — or they with him:
Other Wall Street banks, after doing extensive business with Mr. Trump in the 1980s and 1990s, pulled back in part due to frustration with his business practices but also because he moved away from real-estate projects that required financing, according to bank officials. Citigroup Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley are among the banks that don’t currently work with him.
.
At Goldman Sachs Group Inc., bankers “know better than to pitch” a Trump-related deal, said a former Goldman executive. Goldman officials say there is little overlap between its core investment-banking group and Mr. Trump’s businesses.
That’s why, to a great extent, the Trump organization has come to rely on Deutsche Bank, the one global bank that will do significant business with him:
While many big banks have shunned him, Deutsche Bank AG has been a steadfast financial backer of the Republican presidential candidate’s business interests. Since 1998, the bank has led or participated in loans of at least $2.5 billion to companies affiliated with Mr. Trump, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of public records and people familiar with the matter.
Deutsche Bank started the year by announcing a record-setting loss in 2015 of €6.8 billion.
….
In [recent] weeks, here’s what happened:
- May 16, 2016: Berenberg Bank warns that DB’s woes may be “insurmountable”, noting that DB is more than 40x levered.
- June 2, 2016: Two ex-DB employees are charged in ongoing U.S. Libor probe for rigging interest rates. Meanwhile, the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority says there are at least 29 DB employees involved in the scandal.
- June 23, 2016: Brexit decision hits DB hard. The bank is the largest European bank in London and receives 19% of its revenues from the UK.
- June 29, 2016: IMF issues statement that “DB appears to be the most important net contributor to systematic risks”.
- June 30, 2016: Federal Reserve announces that DB fails Fed stress test in US, due to “poor risk management and financial planning”.
The DB share price has been cut almost in half since the start of the year, and is at 8% of its all time high.
Will the bank survive? Damned if I know. This isn’t my field and I’ve just stumbled on the latest reports of its woes. But one thing seem obvious.
Y’all may have noticed that Herr Drumpf is a candidate for an office that has a significant role in the regulation of credit markets. We’ve never had anyone this close to the presidency whose wealth was so personally at play in decisions that he and his administration would have to make, were that evil day ever to arrive. As Russ Choma and David Corn note in Mother Jones,
…the presumptive GOP nominee also has a tremendous load of debt that includes five loans each over $50 million. (The disclosure form, which presidential candidates must submit, does not compel candidates to reveal the specific amount of any loans that exceed $50 million, and Trump has chosen not to provide details.) Two of those megaloans are held by Deutsche Bank, which is based in Germany but has US subsidiaries. And this prompts a question that no other major American presidential candidate has had to face: What are the implications of the chief executive of the US government being in hock for $100 million (or more) to a foreign entity that has tried to evade laws aimed at curtailing risky financial shenanigans, that was recently caught manipulating markets around the world, and that attempts to influence the US government?
There’s a little schadenfreude to be added to the terror that Herr Drumpf might actually reach the office in which that conflict of interest becomes real. That, of course, comes in the thought that [I so devoutly hope] on November 8, the Donald will return to a business wholly dependent on other people’s money, to face a financial community in which there’s no one left willing to lend him a dime.
A boy can dream….
Image: Marinus van Reymerswaele A Banker and His Wife, first half of the 16th century.
yellowdog
Maybe that’s why he decided to run for President. He’s run out of banks to scam so he decided to scam an entire economy.
Richard Mayhew
So he is not worth $10 billion. In 2012 iirc he told the SEC he had $250 million liquid. His go to bank now would probably be reluctant to front him cash secured by nonliquid assets as they are in trouble and do not need a political shitshow now.
Popcorn please
Mike J
I wouldn’t expect Trump’s policies to differ in any real sense from those of any other Republican. Which is not a vote of confidence in Trump, rather the opposite.
Ultraviolet Thunder
Hiya Tom. I finished your Vulcan book and started Einstein in Berlin yesterday. Really enjoyed Newton and Vulcan. Looking forward to getting into Einstein. History is so cool.
ETA: Thank you for not following David Foster Wallace’s lead in his book on George Cantor, putting in challenging math and saying ‘deal with it’. I appreciate that.
dmsilev
So, has Trump announced the speaker list for the convention yet? Was originally supposed to be Wednsday, postponed until yesterday ostensibly to let the media focus on emails, and since then, nothing. Convention starts in 10 days…
Tom Levenson
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Many thanks! I love all my book-children equally, but Einstein is the work that cost my the most sweat and blood, and it is, I think, my best so far. Hope you find it fun/useful and all the rest.
joel hanes
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
I’m in the middle of Vulcan, and also enjoying it tremendously.
dmsilev
@Richard Mayhew: He claimed that he wrote off the loans to his campaign, converting them to contributions, but has been oddly ….reluctant to supply the documentation that the conversion actually took place. I wonder whether there’s a cash crunch and he’s holding out hope of getting that money back eventually.
Mary G
So he won’t disclose his tax returns, but admits to being in debt upwards of $250 million? And the one bank that has been willing to get into bed with him is failing. It’d be funny if he wasn’t pulling 40% of the vote.
redshirt
Damn, girl is WHITE!
Ultraviolet Thunder
I should be landing in Stuttgart right now but I’m in a hotel in London. Ontario. My 9 day training trip to Germany got abruptly canceled yesterday afternoon because I’m the only one in North America who can 1) fix this particular machine and 2) get across this border. I could be having spargel and bier, but it’s Tim Horton’s instead. I’ll be here until the laser is running, and I haven’t had a day off since 06/26.
I am not happy with my job today.
rikyrah
Someone posted that Ferret Head was being floated by folks in Russia.
Mai.naem.mobile
I’ve said from the beginning that the Trump campaign is just a huge grifting operation. I also think the Romney campaign was a major grifting operation for a couple of his sons. Trump isn’t poor but he lives way beyond his means. I don’t think he’s got the money for the big plane,helicopter,security,Mar Lago, the Penthouse etc. He’s very wealthy but he’s no Paul Singer.
Gemina13
Deutsch’s share price will have to drop lower than that before it implodes, but that’s not saying much. Other factors come into play, like whether the shareholders start courting a takeover before someone else just jumps in and takes DB over. If I had a share in that bank, I’d start letting other shareholders know where my interests lay, namely, in a bank not ripped apart by criminal charges and lawsuits.
It’s only July. Things can easily get worse for DB by the 3rd quarter.
Miss Bianca
I just checked my library system for an audio version of “The Hunt for Vulcan” (because for some reason I love nonfiction on audio book – it must stir up pleasant memories of lecture courses!). They don’t seem to have it, but it looks like it exists, so…purchase suggestion for my library!
Lizzy L
It is customary, though not required, for federal officials to establish a blind trust, to hold, administer and manage her or his private financial assets, investments and ownerships, and of his or her spouse and dependent children, if she or he has any, as a method of conflict of interest avoidance.
I wonder if Trump knows this. I expect that he would just refuse to do it, since it is not required by law.
rikyrah
@Richard Mayhew:
Someone who understands campaign finance is going to figure out the lies that his campaign put out about how much they’ve raised. We’ll know soon enough.
Like others have said..
The GOP Crime Bosses have NOT opened their checkbooks to this con man.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Tom Levenson:
I don’t have the brain to make use of it. Chad Orzel taught his dog, and failed to instruct me. Brian Greene failed too. I read them for the historical aspects.
I did not know where fractional reserve banking originated. The currency crisis in 17th century England due to arbitrage opportunities in precious metals was fascinating.
Tom Levenson
@Ultraviolet Thunder: fun is more than enough.
The book I’m writing now (or rather, not writing while I distract myself here…;-) is all about Newton-era finance. I had no idea what a whacky, wild world it was until I dove in — prompted by some threads drawn from the Newton tale. Look for it (working title Money for Nothing) in two to three years.
maya
@rikyrah:
BitRubles. It’s the next big thing in the financial realm.
Steve in the ATL
@Miss Bianca:
Say what?
Gemina13
@Mary G: Proof that we need to teach fiscal literacy in schools along with logic. There are plenty of people who understand the impossibility of squeezing blood from a stone–i.e., Trump claiming personal wealth in the billions while shorting his campaign operations. But too few people seem able to compare his actions and words and come to the correct conclusion that Shit is Fucked-Up and Bullshit.
Baud
@srv:
Since when have you started signing your comments?
Lizzy L
Off topic, but irresistible: according to CNN, Newt Gingrich said Thursday that if asked, he would feel “compelled to serve the country” as Donald Trump’s running mate.
Of course he would. How noble of him.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Tom Levenson:
I’ll look for that. I got interested in banking after reading Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle, which had a lot to do with merchant banking. It’s not the sexiest subject, but it’s arguably the skeleton and sinews that support economic progress. As we learned to our dismay in 2008. Or I hope we learned something from that debacle.
dmsilev
@rikyrah: Mark July 20th on your calendar. That’s when the FEC report for June comes out, and we’ll get an actual detailed update on his campaign’s finances.
Baud
@Lizzy L: At least he didn’t say “ca-ching”.
Miss Bianca
@Steve in the ATL: I know, weird, huh? I actually *enjoyed* most of my lecture courses!
MattF
Gosh. ‘Poor risk management’. I bet that’s a diplomatic euphemism for ‘lending money to Donald Trump’. When’s the fire sale on Donald’s assets?
Major Major Major Major
@Miss Bianca: oh, sure, you’ll read Tom’s book.
Gemina13
@maya:
BitRubles–for PutinBros everywhere.
germy
@srv: I understand that your credo is to be against whatever we’re for, or to be for whatever we’re against, but do you ever look in your mirror and ask your reflection “Donald fucking Trump? What the fuck am I doing?”
encephalopath
At this point I think it’s entirely possible that Trump has a negative net worth.
Unless he proves otherwise with some relevant financial transparency, that’s what we should all assume to be the case.
NotMax
My understanding is that it isn’t Deutsche Bank the powerhouse that is the only one who will deal with Trump, rather solely a smaller division.
That division might well be cut loose to sink or swim on its own, or be snapped up by who knows who. Either scenario would not bode well for the future of DT’s conniving.
smith
@Lizzy L: Newt has made major sacrifices out of love for his country before.
ThresherK
From the Moral Orel-verse, Clay Puppington ran for reelection to the office of Mayor with the slogan, “I need the money”.
Oh, I’d like life to imitate that for Trump.
Formerly disgruntled Clinton supporter
@smith: He’s a real patriot [gag]
hovercraft
Greg Abbott just thanked Obama for his condolences and offer of support.
That is all.
Technocrat
@srv:
Warren Buffet gives roughly 2 billion dollars a year to the Gates Foundation. Obviously, no one gives billions to charity without some quid pro quo, right? It’d be naive to believe that, I assume.
Wonder what Buffet is getting from Gates?
Darryl Issa should investigate!
redshirt
@Ultraviolet Thunder: I hope you’re paid well and accumulate huge frequent flier miles to be used for awesome vacations.
Mai.naem.mobile
Anybody a little offended by Gov Abbott praising the cops,yet he was part of who made it possible for the shooter to go out with an AK47 with a lots of ammo to gun down the cops. A-hole.
ThresherK
Clay Puppington for Mayor. I need the money.
Manyakitty
@Baud: I’m (rudely) scrolling through this while friends are talking at the pool, and you made me conspicuously LOL. Thanks for blowing my cover, man.
ThresherK
Hey, can someone un-WP my comment? I put a proper link in it an’ everything.
Dmbeaster
@srv: Unlike your boy wonder, the finances of the Foundation are public and subject to AG scrutiny as is any other charitable trust. There is no imaginary secret influence peddling by the Foundation except those imaginary ones embraced by the right wing fever swamps you inhabit. Your con man hero could never survive the same scrutiny if he made the same disclosures required by the Foundation.
Meanwhile, Trump’s main man makes his real living off Putin, while being privy to classified briefings given to the Trump campaign. But look over there! Clinton Foundation!
Aleta
It’s doubtful that a regular citizen could pass a background check for a even a medium-level security clearance with Trump’s record of debt, bankruptcies and foreign ties. It boggles the mind to think of him receiving clearances simply because of being nominated or elected.
Mike J
@hovercraft:
Manyakitty
@ThresherK: It already does. His last FEC filing showed a substantial amount of his budget going to interests of either him or his kids.
nutella
Trump has cheated Deutsche Bank out of millions, including threatening to sue them for billions.
Their profit margin with him must be huge. Or something’s going on under the table.
redshirt
@Mike J: In other news, water still wet.
MattF
@encephalopath: Trump is probably playing some game with his assets– like using them repeatedly to secure a whole lot of indebtedness with various sketchy lenders. People have talked about his various real estate assets, but I’ve never seen anything like a complete accounting. I’m guessing that’s because there isn’t one.
ETA: Not to mention the ‘value’ of the Trump ‘brand’. It’s a WTF in spades.
Technocrat
@Baud:
Out loud.
For real though, Newt is no dummy. This is not his first rodeo. He’s recognized the Trump campaign for the Grift Gravy Train it is. There is zero chance he thinks he will be Vice President of anything but book sales.
ThresherK
@Manyakitty: Heehee. “Nepotism is when your nephew is a damn fool!” (How to Succeed…)
This is the Clay Puppington campaign poster from Morel Orel, t-shirtified.
Matt McIrvin
@Aleta: Don’t forget, the Republicans are making noises about denying Clinton access to the security briefings because of the email server mess.
I have to admit, it’s a classic move: preemptively accuse your opponent of the same things that are your candidate’s greatest weaknesses, so that if they bring up the subject it just looks like a weak “tu quoque” retort. Going early and hard after Bill Clinton’s sexual behavior is the same kind of thing: they know Trump has personally done all the same stuff and far worse, so they get their retaliatory smears in first to neutralize it.
Miss Bianca
@Major Major Major Major: damme, sir, I say, damme!
What’s your email link again? ; )
Howard Beale IV
Just think about it: LinkedIn’s market cap is bigger than Deutsche Bank’s. And Deutsche Bank has been declared a Systematically Important Financial Institution. Hell, even though it’s not public yet, Uber’s alleged market valuation is considered three times higher than DB. Many of the regional banks in the US have much higher market caps than DB – SunTrust, BB&T, US Bank, PNC.
It’s crazy.
MattF
@Matt McIrvin: Right. Given Trump’s bankruptcies and his being pals with various Russian kleptocrats, he’d never get a security clearance.
Major Major Major Major
@Miss Bianca: theworldbeyondeels at gmail ?
Ultraviolet Thunder
@redshirt:
When you work 150-200 days a year away from home, a vacation is turning off the phone and staying in your own house. I do get perks, but who wants to travel when you just got back?
I’m training a new Canadian guy and have high hopes of his taking over the work on this side of the border within the year. Then I can go back to taking jobs in Mexico instead of Quebec in February.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
Wasn’t one of Nixon’s problems he had to make a lot money a corporate lawyer first before he ran for president because no conservative would take him seriously until then?
Baud
@Howard Beale IV: Lots of companies have market caps bigger than financial institutions. Apple isn’t about to labeled a SIFI. Size is just one factor.
Miss Bianca
@Manyakitty: Baud usually manages to get *at least* one LOL per thread from yours truly. And yes…I have been busted on it!
@Major Major Major Major: Tracking. : )
Feathers
One thing about the next election cycle is that the parties really need to do more vetting of the candidates they let into the debates. Tax returns should be released. I’d be OK with submitted to the party for public release down the road, but the tax return issue needs to be out of a candidate’s hands by the time they enter the race. That would have helped the Dems this year as well.
Was anything made of Trump’s indebtedness in the primaries? I think they all just thought/hoped/wished that he’d just fall by the wayside.
Letting people run for President of the United States for fun has got to stop.
dogwood
@Technocrat:
Newt might just think that Trump will get himself impeached or be forced to resign. Then he can become America’s philosopher King.
lollipopguild
Tom l.-When you were on the planet Vulcan did you have a chance to talk to Mr. Spock? I read your book and really liked it.
eclare
@Ultraviolet Thunder: What do you do? Saw your posts about Tuscaloosa, and that you were going to Germany, thought that was a weird combo.
MattF
@dogwood: I’d refrain from trying to read Noot’s mind.
Baud
@srv: Derp.
Major Major Major Major
@srv: that’s dumb even by your standards.
satby
@Ultraviolet Thunder: That totally stinks. But job security? Doesn’t sound like they could ever afford to RIF you.
burnspbesq
@nutella:
A long time ago, i was told that if a large corporation was doing something that appeared screwy, the answer to the question “why are they doing that” would most likely be found in senior execs’ bonus formulas. At a place like DB, you don’t get ahead by not doing deals.
Emma
@Miss Bianca: Audible.com. That’s where I got mine, but you need a membership. You can probably also get it directly from Amazon.
satby
@Aleta: shoot, I’m having trouble getting a corporate job since my credit took a dive after my layoff. And I don’t work with financial stuff at all. I mostly train staff and manage help desks, when I work in IT.
jl
I’m sure any issues that ensue from possible DB problems are covered in articles VIII through XII of the Constitution, or maybe it’s chapters 7 through 15, which Beloved and Dear President Trump will use to resolve all difficulties. Trump is a world class expert on those parts of the Constitution and knows more about them than anybody, despite what the weak loser liberal scoffers say on this almost Top 10,000 miserable lefty blog.
nutella
@burnspbesq:
Heh. Probably right.
What was I thinking expecting a big company to be run for the benefit of the company’s or shareholders’ bottom lines?
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@Major Major Major Major: I’m in, too, if slots are still available. I’ll email now.
PeakVT
@Ultraviolet Thunder: I worked about 6 months straight (7 days a week). But I am on vacation now and I haven’t even left my yard for 3 days. It’s bliss.
Back to work tomorrow, though.
Emma
@germy: Vampires keep no mirrors.
Major Major Major Major
@1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet): cool, thanks.
Glad somebody finally took that nym too ??
PeakVT
Also, I really hope DB has to be bailed out in a spectacular fashion. That would be some karma that Merkel and the rest of the German political establishment deserve.
debbie
@redshirt:
I take it you haven’t seen many female portraits from that period, like Elizabeth I? They took “porcelain complexion” very seriously.
jl
@PeakVT: Any problems in the German economy will be found to be caused by a sad but excusable excess of virtue. Their economists have proven that already.
Major Major Major Major
@Emma: how do they tie all those bow ties?
encephalopath
@burnspbesq:
This still rings true for the time I have spent working for corporations in the last 15 years.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@satby: @eclare:
I fix industrial lasers for a huge German company. Mostly in auto manufacturing. Also in research and weird things like medical devices production. One day in a bunny suit in an air conditioned cleanroom, and the next up on a machine platform in 110 degree heat and shocking grime.
It isn’t boring, and the pay is about what you’d imagine you’d get for the working conditions 50-60 hours a week.
And I get to use words like femtosecond and gigawatt in casual conversation like some kind of savant nerd in steel toe boots.
Roger Moore
@dmsilev:
I assume that’s exactly what happened. He knew he was going to have trouble getting donations as long as it was understood that the money would go to pay back his loans to himself, so he claimed he was going to write them off in the hopes it would get the donations flowing. Now that they apparently are, he’s going to hold out for as long as possible before actually submitting any paperwork, since every day he goes without is one day of donations that can be used to pay back his loans. He isn’t going to produce that paperwork until it starts hurting his flow of donations again.
rikyrah
12 cops had discharged their weapons in Dallas. Makes sense. How many cops died from ‘ friendly fire’?
Emma
@Major Major Major Major: Their man-servants do it for them — in between eating flies, of course.
rikyrah
Did they release everyone else that they had pulled in for questioning in Dallas?
Ultraviolet Thunder
@PeakVT:
This Germany training was supposed to be a break for me from teh grind. I was seriously miffed when they canceled it less than a day before my flight, and assigned me to an awful, urgent job. I’m going to lobby for another training trip there in the fall. Maybe October. Maybe Munich.
Roger Moore
@Lizzy L:
It wouldn’t work for Trump anyway. His biggest single asset right now is his name, which can’t be put into a blind trust.
Jack the Second
@srv: Here’s another great set of interesting connections you may want to peruse.
O. Felix Culpa
@Jack the Second: Priceless.
hovercraft
@dmsilev:
Yes I can’t wait to that report, he claims over 50 million raised for him and the party but has not filed with the FEC. I smell a rat, some campaign experts were saying that the bs info he released looked like he was counting money from May in his June numbers. Maybe he thinks that the convention and vp hullubaloo will drown out the numbers. We will see.
Tom Levenson
@lollipopguild: I so hoped to get a blurb from Boston-area homeboy Leonard Nimoy. Bastard had to go and die on me….
rikyrah
@Roger Moore:
I think the entire opposite. HE SAID that he was going to ‘forgive’ the loans, and he thought that the GOP Crime Bosses would take him at his word, and start giving the checks.
But, the GOP Crime Bosses KNOW how he works, and never believed a word that he said, and refused to open up their checkbooks.
So, we get the first story of him ‘ forgiving’ the loans, but no paperwork, and nobody can find the paperwork.
THEN, we get the gigantic fundraising number that I’m sure includes the ‘ forgiving’ of the loans.
He never had any intentions of forgiving the loans. He has just run into a group of people who actually are quite clear about how he works his cons.
Steeplejack (phone)
@ThresherK:
Whatever you did, the link doesn’t work.
hovercraft
@Mike J:
Well Obama didn’t threaten to disband every police department in the country and name Cornell West, Bernie Sanders and Killer Mike, Attorney General, FBI Director, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court supreme. You decide who goes where, that would be a strong response.
Aleta
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Try the Marienbad Restaurant and Pub, German beer and Czech food, in London near Dundas St and Queens, near the river.
Miss Bianca
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
You do realize, of course, that now I’m picturing you in an actual bunny suit.
Juju
@Jack the Second: The Scripts spelling bee, venomous spider connection is something that’s going to keep me up at night.
Shell
Ugh. Could he be any more “Ass-plant smooch here”?
SiubhanDuinne
@Lizzy L:
Not only would we go from Barack and Uncle Joe to Donald and Newton Leroy as POTUS and VPOTUS — we would also go from Michelle and Dr. Jill to Melania and Callista as FLOTUS and SLOTUS. I really don’t think I could take that.
Baud
@Miss Bianca: I’m turned on too.
Major Major Major Major
@Miss Bianca: you’re not afraid of bunny suits?
*updates list*
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Aleta:
REALLY!? That’s a mile away. Sounds like my stop for celebration after this mission is done. Thanks for the recommendation. Easy name to remember.
Roger Moore
@Juju:
I’m amazed by the Cheese Consumption/Bedsheet Strangling correlation. Are there really nearly 1000 people a year who die of strangling in their bedsheets?
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne:
I think Newt fancies himself as the next Puppetmaster.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@Miss Bianca:
Let me take the edge off that. That was the assignment where I asked what they were processing with their high power pulse laser and they casually handed me four square feet of dried human cadaver epidermis. Just handed it to me in a sterile bag. Now if it doesn’t look like transmission parts from a distance I keep my mouth shut.
Major Major Major Major
@Ultraviolet Thunder: now Miss B’s probably envisioning *that* AND the actual bunny suit.
Shell
You forgot to add “sheeples” to the end of that.
SiubhanDuinne
@Miss Bianca:
Did you hear her? Did you hear her?
Oh the monster overbearing!
Don’t go near her — don’t go near her,
She is swearing, she is swearing!!
Emma
@Ultraviolet Thunder: It sounds faintly Silence of the Lambs to me!
PeakVT
@Ultraviolet Thunder: You’re really going to turn *some* people on now.
Balloon-Juice attracts all types, dontchaknow. And it’s still #1 on the net for kitten skull-*ucking!
Shell
You forgot to add “sheeples” to the end of that.
Technocrat
@Juju:
Bicyclists killed in collision with stationary object vs People who died by falling from a ladder
Makes perfect sense if the stationary object is a ladder that’s in use.
scav
@Major Major Major Major: I’m already fully envisioning a sort of furries-disco themed wake and creation party.
redshirt
I met a woman at a party once who’s job was to purchase foreskins from hospitals for use in research.
She had a nice title, but she was really a foreskin purchaser.
Shell
You forgot to add “sheeples” to the end of that.
Shell
Suddenly I cant post any comments?
Major Major Major Major
@redshirt: Foreskin Angels – Rachel Bloom
Baud
@redshirt: How much does a good foreskin go for?
eclare
@Ultraviolet Thunder: That sounds very impressive. I hope your travel issues get sorted out. Although it might be better to be out of the US right now. PS, my condolences about being in Tuscaloosa. Went to an SEC school, not Aladamnbama.
Uncle Cosmo
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Keep in mind that Oktoberfest this year is in fact September 17 through October 3. You might want to nudge the arrival date back into the previous month. Then again, you might not: The beer will be just as good after the rubble has stopped bouncing in oom-pah-pah rhythm.
If you really want to get shitfaced in style, go to Prague for the Czech Beer Festival next May. I went a few years back (staying with a friend just one Metro stop away); 85 brands & not a clinker in the bunch.
PeakVT
@Shell: Only the comments you really want to post. FYWP is tricky and devious in that way, among others.
ETA: … and now my comment makes no sense. FYWP.
redshirt
@Major Major Major Major: LOL. It’s so weird.
Technocrat
@redshirt:
Would you say she had a circumspect title that lacked precision?
Roger Moore
@debbie:
He needs to remember what Cactus Jack Garner said about the vice presidency.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
You spelled Oktoberfest wrong.
redshirt
@Baud: She bought in bulk.
Major Major Major Major
@redshirt: don’t slut shame.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tom Levenson:
He only does it to annoy
Because he knows it teases.
Baud
@redshirt: No questions asked, I assume.
The Pale Scot
In the scheme of things, 50 mil isn’t really a “mega” loan.
And will the MSM ever stop tiptoeing around the reality that between Libor, the various derivative scams, and mortgage loan fraud the finance industry has stolen somewhere between 2 to 8 trillion dollars in the last 20 years.
What’s the term of venery for vampire squids? I can’t find a word big or sleazy enough. Well maybe, a Sleaze of Squids? “Vampire” messes up the meter.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@eclare:
Thanks. Tuscaloosa wasn’t bad except for the 100 degree heat and the thunderstorm that trapped me on the top floor of a hotel with no power one night. That was last week. This week I’m sorta glad to be north of the border where guns are taken with appropriate seriousness. One reason I’m the only one who can come here/do this: several of my colleagues have firearms related issues on their records. No big deal in the ‘States, but will absolutely keep you out of Canada. As much as I bitch about traveling in Ontario, it is safer.
O. Felix Culpa
@Juju:
Mike J
@Emma: More Donnie Darko.
SiubhanDuinne
@Miss Bianca:
With long pink ears and a fluffy tail….
O. Felix Culpa
@SiubhanDuinne: Beat him when he sneezes!
redshirt
@Technocrat: Heh. It was something like Manager of Biologic Acquisitions or something like that. Long time ago.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
You should have gone last year.
Roger Moore
@redshirt:
I believe that they prefer to refer to that kind of thing as “discard tissue”.
redshirt
@Baud: Since she had a job in this area, I assume there were competitors, and therefore bids.
Emma
@Mike J: Ugh. That’s… interesting, it is.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
Five bucks, same as in town.
Major Major Major Major
@redshirt:
SiubhanDuinne
@Technocrat:
Executive Assistant Deputy Vice President for Hubris
eclare
@Ultraviolet Thunder: Hope you get to enjoy being home soon. Although it sounds like a really interesting job, and you definitely have job security.
SiubhanDuinne
@O. Felix Culpa:
SPEAK HARSHLY
redshirt
@Major Major Major Major: LOL. Shut the fuck up Donny!
Poopyman
@Baud:
What separates a good foreskin from a bad foreskin?
Major Major Major Major
@Poopyman: A shower.
gogol's wife
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
I spent a few days in London, Ont., decades ago, and I thought it was the nicest town I’d even been in.
Martha from Augusta
@Poopyman: The glans?
Uncle Cosmo
@O. Felix Culpa: I was the prohibitive favorite in my elementary school spelling be in 6th grade…& bombed out on the first word I was given (pier). Two years later I won the junior high school bee, squeaked into the regional finals finishing 10th in the county (appellate) & ended up 3rd (top male) in the state (queue). Ain’t no tellin’. :^p
Felonius Monk
According to Margaret and Helen:
and more
SiubhanDuinne
All this talk of foreskins reminds me of one of my all-time favourite moments on NPR’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me.”
There was a question that essentially boiled down to “What did Aristotle Onassis use to cover the barstools on his luxury yacht?” and the answer was “The foreskins of Blue Whales.”
So the host, Peter Sagal, asked rhetorically “What kind of person would take a job circumcising Blue Whales?” and without missing a beat, one of the panellists replied “Call me Ishmoyel.”
I can LOL about it to this day, and it must be at least ten years ago.
Felonius Monk
@Poopyman:
A scalpel?
redshirt
@Roger Moore: One man’s discarded tissue is another woman’s job.
Uncle Cosmo
@SiubhanDuinne: Jeebus H. Cripes on a Harley, as an FMS (Former Mackerel Snapper) I remember that joke fondly–& I tell it exceedingly well.
I would lay good money you also know the one whose punch line is
Ultraviolet Thunder
@gogol’s wife:
Big enough to be interesting and small enough to be friendly. Closer to Toronto it’s like all big cities: brusque and impersonal.
Gotta get up at 4:30. Night, all, and thanks for another fascinating evening. I’ll probably have a nightmare about the foreskin collectors now.
Mike in NC
When we toured London (UK) a couple of years ago, the most interesting pub name we saw was “Hung Drawn & Quartered”.
Felonius Monk
@debbie:
When, in fact, he would just be a Derp Vader.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
OT, but there’s a huge protest outside CNN in Atlanta about their bullshit programming, happening now. They’re not covering it. If the revolution is televised, CNN will have counterprogramming.
Emma
@SiubhanDuinne: You are SO lucky I had set down my coffee! Otherwise, the laptop bill would be winging its way to you soonest!
Elmo
@Ultraviolet Thunder: God yes.
My next six weeks:
Charlotte
El Paso
Louisville
Chicago
Home
Portland
“But Elmo, why don’t you take your wife anywhere on vacation?”
Dude. Because I just got back.
Central Planning
@burnspbesq: one of the quotes I’ve learned at work is “compensation drives behavior”
SiubhanDuinne
@Uncle Cosmo:
Huh. I remember the punch line but would have to wander way back in memory to retrieve the set-up.
Same with a joke whose punch is “He says he knows Mother!!”
GregB
I think there is a typo. Trump keeps his money in a German Duetche-bag.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
That could have gone so many ways, but you choose the classy option.
JPL
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: Here’s a live feed.. link Earlier they were trying to shut down an interstate. If they went to be heard, maybe the way to do it, is not to close down an interstate. just sayin
Elmo
@Uncle Cosmo:
“Reliquary.”
Fuck me, I added the “c” because I’d never seen the word and asked for the definition.
I’ve never forgotten that, in forty years.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
The Aristocrats!
Mike J
Schlemazel Khan
@JPL:
as if anything else works
Keith G
@Baud:
And does the temperature of the sales room have any impact on price?
Now, when I first scanned Tom’s headline and illustration, I first though of the Iron Bank. However, once I got down here, the Cock Merchant come to mind.
TGOT is life!
Eta – @Major Major Major Major: Experience is a harsh teacher, yes? BTW – Best tag of the day.
Elmo
@encephalopath: My experience is a little different. Usually the answer is “Because we’ve always done it that way,” and if you had a mind you could trace it back to one middle manager with severe emotional problems and a stress disorder who decided it was the best way to keep people from making her phone ring.
JPL
@Schlemazel Khan: Shutting down a highway causes more animosity… not less..
Bqhatevwr
O. Felix Culpa
@Elmo: I’m sure there’s a classification in the DSM for spelling bee induced trauma.
lollipopguild
@Tom Levenson: By Grapthar’s Hammer!
Juju
@Roger Moore: perhaps it’s some form of natural selection or just getting wild in the bedsheets gone terribly wrong.
Baud
Hillary gave a speech tonight at the AME Church in Philadelphia. I only saw her Twitter stream, but it seems like a strong speech.
Keith G
@O. Felix Culpa:
A new branch of Beehiveral Science?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: Just saw people tweeting a link to this video.
Schlemazel Khan
@JPL:
Yes, you are right. OTOH you have not had multiple people who sort of look like you get shot for no good reason so you may not understand the frustration of being killed & then ignored. Shutting down the freeway looks counter-productive but it does express the frustration in a way that will get noticed. Polite people generally are ignored.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL:
Oh yes. I still have vivid memories of Freaknik.
Mike J
@Keith G: Alphapiphobia?
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Thanks. Might watch it later.
James E Powell
@Baud:
Watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=feJbR25IHj4
michael hart
A bowl of spaghetti walks into a bar and orders a beer
The bartender says, “we don’t serve food here!”
Central Planning
@O. Felix Culpa: my 6th grade teacher pronounced “tentative” as “tenative” (which is valid) so I lost. Sign me up for therapy
Baud
@James E Powell: Thank you.
JPL
@Schlemazel Khan: All I can say is you don’t know me.
But make your judgments anyway
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@JPL:
It makes shit real. Like, really real. I’m sure there were many people pissed off when they couldn’t use the Edmund Pettus bridge, too.
ETA: They’re not just blocking the freeway, they’ve fucking occupied it.
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: Yes I remember that. There was a person who worked in the Krogers boasting the next morning as I walked by. I went to the front desk with tears in my eyes and said what I heard. Days later I happened to be checking out, and the baggers were talking among them, mentioning that they were glad he was gone, because he was a real jerk.
Sometimes speaking up works.
also.. the workers were afraid to speak up, but were glad that a shopper did.
Schlemazel Khan
@JPL:
oddly enough I would say the same thing
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
I have a good friend — former colleague who went back to school and is now an ordained AME minister — who is in Philly for the convention. I assume, and hope, that she was in the hall for Hillary’s speech (which I just watched, BTW: good speech).
Keith G
@Baud: T’was an interesting speech. Better than I thought it would be. There are a lot of different constituencies that she needed to give a “hug” to. That is usually a script for a muddled performance, but she hit the right notes and she managed to tie up substance with appropriate style.
JPL
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: The city of Atlanta is giving space to rally and protest.
Shutting down interstate highways only punishes those who might favor change. It’s just my opinion.
Lurker Extraordinaire
@Uncle Cosmo: Plus, in order to get into some of the Oktoberfest beer tents, you have to purchase tickets months or even a year in advance.
There are always fests around Germany, no need to deal with Oktoberfest. Smaller fests are just as fun, if not more so. I recommend Killianifest in Wurzberg, if you can get there soon. Usually held end of July.
Sorry. Back to lurking.
Villago Delenda Est
DB bankster: “What do you mean, ‘poor risk management’?”
Fed auditor: “You loan to Donald Trump”.
DB bankster: “Oh, yeah, that thing..”
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: That really made me sad and since it was a store I shopped in, they knew me. The gal I complained to, was white also and she became teary eyed. It was nice though, to overhear the baggers talk about the jerk.
Major Major Major Major
@efgoldman: is it Spargelzeit already? Time flies.
JPL
Here’s another feed to the Atlanta protest.. link
Feathers
@Elmo: I love hearing crazy, nonsensical rules and imagining the dumbass who fucked up and the response was that rule. At MIT, they have signs next to the elevator stating that you should evacuate the building if there is a fire or you hear an alarm and that “It is Institute policy not to fight fires.” That sentence deserves fanfic.
Uncle Cosmo
@Elmo: I was going to say that I’d never forgotten those words in over 50 years. But I did. Or at least I misremembered. Because the word I missed on in the state final wasn’t queue–it was escrow. (Two legal terms that year–I was a STEM kid with no interest in the profession.)
Yet I distinctly remember missing on queue. Must have been in 7th grade.
“Till then, my noble friend, chew upon this”*: In how many languages does the notion of a spelling bee as a test of mental moxie even make sense? I can’t think of another besides English. Most languages that use some sort of linear alphabet have been put in written form recently enough that most everything is spelled exactly as pronounced. Greek, maybe–but even there you have a very limited number of sounds (mostly vowels) that are represented by multiple letter groupings producing ambiguity in possible spellings. (My Greek instructor told us his mother was always misspelling words in her letters but what she intended was always obvious once you pronounced it.)
* Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene 2.
Avalie
@Elmo: that was the same word that bumped me out of the regional bee in Tulsa about the same time. Same mistake.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL:
I only remember sitting for, literally, hours on the Connector trying to get home from work — this would have been some time in the early ’90s, when my office was still downtown in CNN Center — and listening to the radio traffic reporters describing conditions that I was in the middle of! I don’t recall being particularly judgmental about it then or later (any more than I have been over the years about various Presidential motorcades screwing up Atlanta traffic at rush hour) — and anyhow, Freaknik was just a Spring Break, not a protest. I do remember feeling very sorry for the wedding party who couldn’t get to the church because the partiers were blocking their cars on the Interstates. I think they ended up getting out, abandoning their vehicles, and walking to the venue, but I’m foggy on the details after all these years.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
No, but I’m guessing the alien Callista does.
Glidwrith
@Baud: Roughly $200. Lungs cost about $1000.
Elmo
@Avalie: NO!! Seriously?!
That’s – I don’t even know, but I’m grinning like an idiot over here that somebody else had the same word stock in their head for the same reason. HA!
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
May I politely refer you, good sir, to SiubhanDuinne.
I thank you, sir.
rikyrah
@Mike J:
uh huh
uh huh
Davis X. Machina
@Uncle Cosmo: The French had a national dicteé competition for adults. That’s how baked their orthography is — and the finals were televised.
Eric U.
@Uncle Cosmo: my son burned out on spelling bees after he competed in one. He was a spelling phenomenon in 1st grade. His teacher made all the kids come up with their own spelling list, but he didn’t find it challenging. So his kept getting more ridiculous, but I think he topped out with ‘antidisestablishmentarianism’.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
Yes, yes I do.
Not goin there, not gettin out of that boat, not eatin that puddin.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
LOL.
When I first worked in radio, we bicycled in a lot of programs on disc, everything from the CBC’s “Ookpik the Arctic Owl” to Kenneth Horne’s comedy program “Round the Horne.” One of the characters on Horne’s show was called Spasm the Butler, and his catch-phrase (in a high, wavering voice) was “I have been here for many years. Many, many, many years. Many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many years. Many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many ….”
Maybe you had to be there.
burnspbesq
@The Pale Scot:
Would you perhaps want to substantiate that number with actual data from a reliable source?
Miss Bianca
@Baud: Goddammit!! You’re doing it to me AGAIN, you creature! LOL!
@Major Major Major Major: No, clowns scare me, but not the Easter bunny. I am not Anya the Vengeance Demon.
Miss Bianca
@SiubhanDuinne: you are funny!
@Uncle Cosmo: I remember that joke! I haven’t heard it in years, tho!
SiubhanDuinne
@Miss Bianca:
It’s W. S. Gilbert who is funny, but I’ll take credit for knowing the perfect G&S quotation :-)
PurpleGirl
@Technocrat: Warren Buffet doesn’t want to administer the money himself. Since Gates wants to actually be involved with running his foundation. (In fact some in the non-profit field think Gates takes too much interest in who he gives the money.) Buffet also doesn’t want to decide who to give the money, Gates does that for him.
Buffet has given money to each of his children to give away according to their interests.
Avalie
@Elmo: Yep. Spelled it with a c after I heard the definition. 8th grade, maybe 1979?
The Pale Scot
@burnspbesq:
At the top is the Libor frauds, which has estimates of 1.5 trillion to 3 trillion dollars. I can’t unravel the CDS-mortgage fraud history in a paragraph. That link is to a blog which can be sorta conspiracy nuttish, but if you click thru his links you end at articles from legitimate news sources.
I would add the GS fraud that allowed Greece to join the EU. Basically starting with S&L scandal in the 80’s.
I suppose the abacus in the back of my head is also totaling value lost thru questionable yet still technically legal schemes, like back in the early 2000’s when GS talked N. Dakota utility execs into selling all their plants and plowing the money into fiber optic cable systems. GS skimmed 300 mil for the bond issue to make that go. This utility was a major part of the savings portfolios of local population, the utility did not inform their shareholders in a timely manner, you can guess how that worked out.
Since the investment banks went public after the end of Glass/Steagal and are now using other people’s money at the casino, their actions have become more and more sociopathic.
I’m from the Louis Rukeyser era, I have a big problem with the avoidance of fiduciary responsibilities in the modern era. Especially with the end of private pensions (everybody is suppose to manage their money on their own, while the stockbroker is like a RE agent).
Goodnight, hope this helps
No One You Know
@Poopyman: Tiny hands.
The Pale Scot
@The Pale Scot: PS
It’s called “I Won’t Be Here You won’t Be Here” – IWBHYWBH (when the shit hits the fan)
Emily68
@Shell: Notice how Newt didn’t feel compelled to serve his country when we were fighting the Viet Nam war. He compulsions come and go.
J R in WV
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
Dude, if you’re the only person in the World who can fix certain specific high-tech stuff, you should get another zero added to your pay check right away! And stock, and a company paid 401K. And your own card for private jets, the hell with those airlines!
polyorchnid octopunch
@The Pale Scot: Why, a venal, of course, as in “a venal of vampire squids”.