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You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / The Shrinking Behemoth

The Shrinking Behemoth

by John Cole|  May 4, 20097:37 pm| 112 Comments

This post is in: Domestic Politics

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Here is an interesting piece on the financial industry, describing how much it had grown in the past few decades and what it should probably look like.

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Previous Post: « Objectively Pro-Corporate Tax Cheats
Next Post: What’s the end game here? »

Reader Interactions

112Comments

  1. 1.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 7:46 pm

    spellcheck title?

  2. 2.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 7:50 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker:
    He means that it’s become a jugger-not.

  3. 3.

    neddie jingo

    May 4, 2009 at 7:51 pm

    What’s a “Behometh” when it’s at home?

  4. 4.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 7:52 pm

    @Dennis-SGMM:

    Gar-gan-chu-an.

  5. 5.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 7:53 pm

    That would be behemoth, though. Or am I missing a joke?

  6. 6.

    used to be disgusted

    May 4, 2009 at 7:59 pm

    Interestingly, if you google “behometh” you get an amazingly large number of people talking about behomeths.

  7. 7.

    robertdsc

    May 4, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    I thought this was a thread about Tunch. My bad.

  8. 8.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    @asiangrrlMN:
    You missed nothing. We’re just enjoying the chance to savage Cole’s misspelling.

  9. 9.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:02 pm

    I thought it was a new BSG character.

  10. 10.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 8:03 pm

    @Dennis-SGMM: Whew! I didn’t want to be left out of the loop. Though, used to be disgusted is right. There is a lot of crap on Googly about behomeths.

    Oh, and in response to the article–naht ganna happ’n without stricter regulation. Wall Street and bankers still fucking think they create their own realities.

  11. 11.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:06 pm

    Main webpage at an evangelical website?

  12. 12.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:07 pm

    @asiangrrlMN:

    Oh, and in response to the article—naht ganna happ’n without stricter regulation. Wall Street and bankers still fucking think they create their own realities.

    Heaven forfend that the Masters of the Universe be in any way forestalled from dreaming up new variations of the Ponzi Scheme!

  13. 13.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:07 pm

    Yah know John is going to be pissed when he gets back here and finds out you are all making fun of his typo. Just sayin…..

  14. 14.

    Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse

    May 4, 2009 at 8:08 pm

    John’s just describing how McMansions have become a lot less attractive to house buyers.

  15. 15.

    Laura W

    May 4, 2009 at 8:09 pm

    Are you trying to subliminally suggest that I should Be a Meth Ho?
    ‘Cuz I will, you know.
    If it makes you happy.

  16. 16.

    Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse

    May 4, 2009 at 8:10 pm

    Holy crap, it’s behemoth day. Some guy on the radio was just talking about the new ride by that name at Canada’s Wonderland.

  17. 17.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:11 pm

    “Behometh” is a contraction of the phrase “Be home in time for the meth.” Commonly used in and around Wasilla, Alaska.

  18. 18.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:12 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    He’d wonder where his real commenters had gone …..

  19. 19.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 8:12 pm

    @Laura W: Ha! Good one.

    @Litlebritdifrnt: Not a typo, though, since he switched two letters. He deserves some ribbing for confuzzling me.

    @Dennis-SGMM: It’s their god-given right, doncha know. They are the best and the brightest–you know, if I hear THAT applied to the Masters of the Universe one more time, I’m going to smash ’em in their best and brightest bits.

  20. 20.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:13 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker:

    True.

  21. 21.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 8:14 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: Does this site actually have any?
    I mean it’s pretty much just you in your 33 flavor incarnations, right?

  22. 22.

    PeakVT

    May 4, 2009 at 8:14 pm

    At the risk of being on-topic, I think Surowiecki isn’t accounting for how much of the new demand for capital came from LBOs instigators and other non-productive actors. The useful portion of finance relative to the rest of the economy probably hasn’t changed much since the mid-1980s.

  23. 23.

    Laura W

    May 4, 2009 at 8:15 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    Yah know John is going to be pissed when he gets back here and finds out you are all making fun of his typo. Just sayin…..

    That kind of stuff doesn’t piss John off. In fact, I’d bet good Pinot Grigio that it was intentional just to inject some fun and life back into this blog tonight.
    And not a minute too soon.

  24. 24.

    Steeplejack

    May 4, 2009 at 8:15 pm

    I thought Behometh was that small town just outside Altoona. Are they having economic problems too?

  25. 25.

    gypsy howell

    May 4, 2009 at 8:17 pm

    Phew. I was afraid we would be expected to read the linked article and have something interesting or insightful to say about it.

  26. 26.

    Snark Based Reality

    May 4, 2009 at 8:18 pm

    Hmm a quick link with nothing but a line of filler text. I think you mistyped “Open Thread”.

    How am I supposed to be outraged unless you tell me what exactly to be outraged about?

  27. 27.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:18 pm

    @Laura W:

    Hah, I’m on Yellow Tail Chardonnay over ice, my summer tipple (winter is so red wine don’t you think, summer is white over ice, or so it is in Brittyland)

  28. 28.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:19 pm

    @PeakVT:
    Churl.

  29. 29.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:21 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Har. Not that many. I am me, TZ, Snark Intern, Hat on Cat, Smoot’s Ghost and one or two others that I forget. They’re stored in cookies in various machine/browser pairs that I graze over the course of a week or so.

    It’s hell filling out my timecard.

  30. 30.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:23 pm

    Yeah, because I have never fat fingered anything before.

    NEWS FLASH—- TYPO AT BALLOON JUICE

    Will we recover?

  31. 31.

    Beauzeaux

    May 4, 2009 at 8:24 pm

    Here is an interesting piece on the financial industry…

    Would that be “Cokie Roberts” interesting, or another kind?

  32. 32.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 8:25 pm

    That kind of stuff doesn’t piss John off.

    Everything pisses him off. He’s a heater.

  33. 33.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:25 pm

    Corner Stone? You are still here? I thought you got the vapors at the hateful “ideology” I “enabled.”

    Why do you want to hang around here with me “enabling” all that?

  34. 34.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:26 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Pointing out typos most certainly doesn’t piss me off, JSF.

    You know what does? The Ravens.

  35. 35.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:27 pm

    @Beauzeaux: I’m glad someone caught that.

  36. 36.

    Laura W

    May 4, 2009 at 8:27 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt: Beringer Pinot Grigio on ice cut with Perrier Citrus. Not only is it too damn hot for red, it’s almost too damn hot for white. (But for the cool rain today.)
    I hear the siren call of Ketel One Citroen, Perrier Citrus, fresh lime and stevia.
    I’m gonna take some photos of my blueberry bushes for you and JL soon. I am just waiting for them to leaf out a bit more.

  37. 37.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:28 pm

    Everyone knows that there is only one behemoth.

  38. 38.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 8:29 pm

    @John Cole: No. Next question?

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: Wait, you are all those people? Nicely done.

  39. 39.

    Laura W

    May 4, 2009 at 8:29 pm

    @John Cole: John, has anyone told you yet today that you are LOADS OF FUN?!

  40. 40.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:31 pm

    @Laura W: No.

    @Just Some Fuckhead: You know what else pissed me off? It has rained for four straight days here. It is May. It is time for the flowers, damnit.

  41. 41.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:31 pm

    @John Cole:

    My advice is to put it back the way it was and tell everybody “bite me.”

    But that’s just me.

    Heh.

  42. 42.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:31 pm

    See I told you he was gonna be pissed, would you guys listen to me, noooooooo, you figured you would get all picky on his ass, like you have never made a typo ever in your lives, ever. So me in my +3 haze was smarter than all of you. Also. Hic. Besides which making a typo on a blog is like a minor blip, do you know what it is like for your boss to be reading the briefs in a COA case six months later when the case is now in the Supreme Court and your boss is reading the brief to draft his Supreme Court brief and says “there should have been a comma after and” I mean come on!

  43. 43.

    John Cole

    May 4, 2009 at 8:34 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt: For the love of everything holy, I’m not pissed. Hell, ask Laura, who has emailed me corrections and I have responded and thanked her.

    I would much rather you all correct me than have me look like an idiot, especially in this case in which I just fat-fingered things.

  44. 44.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:34 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    I like it when other people make typos, it makes me look better. Which is always my first priority, as I’m sure you know.

  45. 45.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:34 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    These things don’t happen if you use spell czech.

  46. 46.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:35 pm

    @John Cole:

    Yeah pissed was the wrong word, “bite me” would have been better.

  47. 47.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 8:36 pm

    @John Cole: Shhhhhh, Litlebritdifrnt is a different kind of piss and drunk-typing. Do not disturb.

    I want snow, but I’m not getting any. That makes ME grumpy.

    Dennis-SGMM, or if you use the Dvorak system of typing like I do.

    I have a trademark on bite me, by the way. Just FYI.

  48. 48.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:37 pm

    @John Cole:

    I tried to help you on the first post, but you were AFK.

  49. 49.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:37 pm

    @Dennis-SGMM:

    Spell check doesn’t help with a boss who was an English major at Duke for his undergrad and is a nazi when it comes to the comma that dare not speak its name. I HATE THAT COMMA!

  50. 50.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 8:39 pm

    @John Cole: Hah! Good one, boss!

    /toadies

  51. 51.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:39 pm

    @asiangrrlMN:

    The hard part is the costume changes.

  52. 52.

    Laura W

    May 4, 2009 at 8:40 pm

    @John Cole:

    Hell, ask Laura, who has emailed me corrections and I have responded and thanked her.

    HA! If by “Thank” you mean, “DIAF”…
    John, has anyone told you today that you are FULL OF SHIT and LOADS OF FUN?!
    Yer funny.
    Don’t ever change.

  53. 53.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:40 pm

    @asiangrrlMN:

    What did I do? I thought I was putting things quite succinctly this evening. Forgive me.

  54. 54.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 8:40 pm

    @John Cole: May Showers Bring June Flowers.

  55. 55.

    Thankovsky

    May 4, 2009 at 8:42 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    I THINK you’re being accused of drunkposting. Good times.

  56. 56.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:43 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead:

    Now I take exception to someone changing a quote, it is “April Showers bring May Flowers” or my English poetry is way off tonight.

  57. 57.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:43 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead:

    You know what pisses me off? It has never rained for four straight days here in my entire desert rat lifetime. Not once that I can remember. Four days of rain sounds like something absolutely fabulous.

  58. 58.

    Thankovsky

    May 4, 2009 at 8:43 pm

    @John Cole:
    It’s raining like crazy in northern California, too! What the hell? It was all sunny and glorious here just a week ago!

  59. 59.

    asiangrrlMN

    May 4, 2009 at 8:44 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt: I’m just teasing you a bit. Re-read your comment about your boss. It’s funny. Isn’t pissed sloshed in Brit-speak?
    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: That’s when it helps to have excellent stage-hands.

  60. 60.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:45 pm

    @Thankovsky:

    Guilty as accused on many occasions however not tonight.

  61. 61.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 8:45 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    Now I take exception to someone changing a quote, it is “April Showers bring May Flowers” or my English poetry is way off tonight.

    Strange Climes Bring Changed Rhymes.

    Man, I am so on.

  62. 62.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:46 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    Just for You.

  63. 63.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 8:48 pm

    Folks, if there’s anything else you need to get off yer chest, rant about, whatever – just drop me an email. I’m here and I care.

  64. 64.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:48 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead:

    It’s the big inaugural of some darn bad doggerel?

  65. 65.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 8:53 pm

    @John Cole: If I didn’t call you on your cowardly lion routine who would?
    You’re running with a bunch of sycophants otherwise.

  66. 66.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 8:54 pm

    @asiangrrlMN:

    True but I was using the word in US speak, damn it is so hard being US/UK bilingual these days, next thing you know I’ll be asking for a packet of fags at the convenience store and all hell will break loose.

  67. 67.

    Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse

    May 4, 2009 at 8:55 pm

    Just Some Fuckhead is Stuart Smalley?

  68. 68.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 8:56 pm

    You’re running with a bunch of sycophants otherwise.

    Dude, you must have the wrong BJ. Unpleasant disagreement is the glue that holds this place together.

    YES IT IS, GOD DAMN IT.

  69. 69.

    Dennis-SGMM

    May 4, 2009 at 8:57 pm

    …next thing you know I’ll be asking for a packet of fags at the convenience store and all hell will break loose.

    I would think that would depend on the neighborhood. Who knows, you might be presented with the Village People.

  70. 70.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 9:01 pm

    @Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse:

    Just Some Fuckhead is Stuart Smalley?

    Even if I was, there’d be nothing wrong with it. I’m good enough, smart enough and doggone it, people like me! (Or if they don’t, they wisely keep it to themselves.)

  71. 71.

    MikeJ

    May 4, 2009 at 9:01 pm

    next thing you know I’ll be asking for a packet of fags at the convenience store

    One of my brit friends and I were at Fabric one night, and two American girls came up and started talking to us. Then my friend started in about how much he loves a good fag, can’t get started in the morning without a fag, nothing makes a cup of coffee better than a fag.

    Ok, it wasn’t what I was planning, but I still got a blowjob.

  72. 72.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:01 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker:

    Dude, you must have the wrong BJ. Unpleasant disagreement is the glue that holds this place together.

    You know what TZ? I would think you’re right but Cole can’t take the heat when it’s focused on him. He pulled a Big Bad Massa routine on the Kemp thread and essentially told me “my way or the highway”. I’m just a little supplicant commenter and he’s The Man.
    Taking it off here Boss. Taking it off there Luke. I’m shaking it Boss. Shake it over there Luke.
    Yep, I’m the moran I guess.

  73. 73.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:03 pm

    I’m good enough, smart enough and doggone it, people like me!

    George Bush readies himself mentally for a SOTU speech.

  74. 74.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:04 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    You’d act just like him if you had to put up with me for four fucking years.

  75. 75.

    Ned R.

    May 4, 2009 at 9:06 pm

    Speaking as an elegant advanced degree holder in English who never gets anything wrong with his typing and is eating a fine self-made dinner with white wine I’d just like to say dasc;amklr;em;wfasofvhn*GRRRRRAAAH*durnk.

  76. 76.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 9:08 pm

    @Dennis-SGMM:

    I would think that would depend on the neighborhood. Who knows, you might be presented with the Village People.

    One of them was straight.

    Or maybe he just didn’t find me attractive.

  77. 77.

    TenguPhule

    May 4, 2009 at 9:08 pm

    You know what pisses me off? It has never rained for four straight days here in my entire desert rat lifetime. Not once that I can remember. Four days of rain sounds like something absolutely fabulous.

    If it rained 4 straight days in your desert, you’d be flooded out.

  78. 78.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 9:08 pm

    @MikeJ:

    LOL the old we speak the same language but don’t thing is a classic, and I still don’t know what the fook a “pocket book” is, I mean I can handle “handbag” I can roll with “purse” if need be but “pocket book” WTF?

  79. 79.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:10 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: I’m coming for you mofo. Wherever you are – I’m gonna find you for that one.
    Intimating I would’ve voted for Bush even one time is enough for me to dispense unto you an asswhuppin.
    Ok, not me maybe but rather the people I hire to dispense it. Ok, maybe not the poeple I hire to kick your ass but maybe the people I hire to heckle you repeatedly.
    Ok, maybe not the people I hire to heckle you but rather the people I pay to send you nasty-grams.

  80. 80.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 9:10 pm

    @Ned R.:

    LOL what was the dinner BTW?

  81. 81.

    TenguPhule

    May 4, 2009 at 9:10 pm

    Unpleasant disagreement is the glue that holds this place together. extended family connections that make this place a civil war zone.

    Fixed.

  82. 82.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 9:12 pm

    @Corner Stone: Dude, clearly you need some time off. I think you’ve got a lot of pent-up sexual tension from not being able to get laid in teh last twenty or so threads. I’m here for ya when ya come outta yer shame spiral.

  83. 83.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:15 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    It’s become a figure of speech. Here in murrica the pocketbook is your personal finances, your accounts. If something hits you in the pocketbook, it costs you money. If it helps your pocketbook, it makes you money.

    For example, George Bush really did a number on my pocketbook.

  84. 84.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:17 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Actually, not that it’s your biz JSF but I’m dating someone a little here and there. I’m a single parent and so is she so it makes things pretty freakin tough to manage. We’re not at the part where we intro each other to our kids yet. So we steal a little time when we can.
    But with that said, fuck you. Or rather, you’re right. I need some straight up loving.
    Thanks man.

  85. 85.

    TenguPhule

    May 4, 2009 at 9:17 pm

    If something hits you in the pocketbook, it costs you money.

    Yeah, they’re called muggers.

  86. 86.

    Ash Can

    May 4, 2009 at 9:19 pm

    @Ned R.: Gesundheit.

    @Dennis-SGMM:

    These things don’t happen if you use spell czech.

    I’m going to be laughing at that for years.

    — Ash Can + a shot and a beer

  87. 87.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:19 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Uh, did I miss something? I can’t figure what you are talking about. Seriously.

    I was suggesting that Cole might be irritable after putting up with me for four years. I don’t know what this has to do with Bush.

    If I am missing something here, fill me in.

  88. 88.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 9:23 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker:

    But what the f**k is a pocketbook? I understand a purse, I understand a handbag” (the brit term) I understand a wallet, I just do not understand a “pocketbook” is it a book that one keeps in ones pocket to account for all of ones finances? It makes absolutely no sense.

  89. 89.

    TenguPhule

    May 4, 2009 at 9:24 pm

    I just do not understand a “pocketbook” is it a book that one keeps in ones pocket to account for all of ones finances? It makes absolutely no sense.

    British word for wallet.

  90. 90.

    JL

    May 4, 2009 at 9:24 pm

    Did anyone watch The Olde Curiosity Shop on Masterpiece Classic? I recorded it last night and just finished it. What a downer.

  91. 91.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 9:26 pm

    @TenguPhule:

    Gotcha.

  92. 92.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 9:27 pm

    @JL: Still trying to finish the Kent State diaries at KOS. Slow down, hon.

  93. 93.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:28 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    English is a rich language full of strange things. We got it from those odd British people, who let us keep it even after we ran them off because their king was mean.

  94. 94.

    4jkb4ia

    May 4, 2009 at 9:28 pm

    Ovechkin hat trick noted. Crowd shouts “MVP!” at some length.

  95. 95.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:28 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: I was trying to be funny here – and obviously failed. You said I’d “act just like him”, and I used that to call out the BS that anyone could have ever voted for Bush in the first place, much less twice.
    So, I spoofed that.
    Obviously I failed miserably if I have to explain it. My apologies to the board.
    Sorry, sorry. Unlike some people I can say I’m sorry for past mistakes.

  96. 96.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 4, 2009 at 9:31 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker:

    Yeah, I know, I am still trying to figure this stuff out, after 17 years of living here…, same language, different country and all that.

  97. 97.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:31 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Oh no prob. I just didn’t get the joke.

    I’m in a weird mood, three days of stomach flu have left me a little spacey. Right now I am figuring that these could be my last words.

  98. 98.

    Thankovsky

    May 4, 2009 at 9:33 pm

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    An internet warrior after my own heart! :p

  99. 99.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:34 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: As I said previously – my ex had some nasty walking pneumonia and gave it to 15 or so of her extended family, including our child my mom and sister. Everyone but me.
    I’m like Wilford Brimley. I don’t get sick and I won’t ever die.

  100. 100.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:40 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I get everything. The grandkids bring it in and my immune system rolls out the welcome mat.

    My kingdom for a phage.

  101. 101.

    MikeJ

    May 4, 2009 at 9:41 pm

    I can roll with “purse” if need be but “pocket book” WTF?

    Proper young ladies wanted to appear brainy at some time in the past. They always carried books of poetry with them. Eventually somebody substituted a handbag for the book, but it was basically the same size.

  102. 102.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 9:44 pm

    @HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker: Vodka. Lots and lots of vodka.

  103. 103.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 9:46 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I don’t get sick and I won’t ever die.

    Good thing, cuz we’re gonna totally trash you when yer dead. In front of yer kid. Til she cries.

  104. 104.

    HitlerWorshippingPuppyKicker

    May 4, 2009 at 9:46 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I tried that but the grandkids won’t drink it.

  105. 105.

    Anne Laurie

    May 4, 2009 at 9:47 pm

    John, you could’ve gone with claiming you meant Behayma, as in the Yiddish insult, literally “water buffalo”, for a big fat sloppy low-class woman. Putting English vowels into Yiddish words is somewhere between ‘free form’ and ‘random’ so there is no resorting to canon that doesn’t start an argument. And the banking industry has truly become a big fat sloppy low-class industry, although not very female…

    Litlebritdifferent, I once had a senior VP, my boss’s boss — a British expat, no less! — who literally spent almost three years at the beginning of the 1990s harrassing the tech support people because he didn’t like the way the Times Roman font looked when a sentence ended with an ‘R’. Despite his Oxford education, he could *not* be persuaded that the geeks weren’t slacking (or worse, mocking him) in their stubborn refusal to re-arrange the kerning between the ‘R’ and the period. The administrative assistants in the office wasted an inordinate amount of time re-writing sentences so that the Tragic Combination wouldn’t appear on any reports seen by Lord SVP. Yes, this was in the financial services industry, how did you guess?

  106. 106.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 10:02 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead: I have a son. And you know what? I can’t believe advocating for people, for the powerless, the poor, the non-lobbyist will ever stand me in poor stead with him.
    We donate to Star of Hope, Goodwill, Salvation Army, Habitat for Humanity and have walked in three American Cancer Society 5k’s – and he’s 4.
    And when I say “we”, I mean he and I. I take him with me everywhere and every time to donate or contribute. He may not understand it all yet but one day he will.
    He picks out toys and clothes he’s ready to donate, and in the store he picks up the brown paper grocery bag we buy to donate.
    I know yours was a toss off comment, intended to slight me, but the fact is that I would never take a position against people in need, nor advocate for the strong against the weak.
    I’ve spent my lifetime doing what I can, not just talking about it. If my son looks down on me in my box and finds reason to castigate my actions then it’s on me for not doing enough.
    Not for taking the wrong path.

  107. 107.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    May 4, 2009 at 10:29 pm

    @Corner Stone: I’m reliably informed you stole that from Nixon’s Checkers speech.

  108. 108.

    tc125231

    May 4, 2009 at 10:43 pm

    NEWS FLASH——TYPO AT BALLOON JUICE….
    Will we recover?

    Be still, my heart.

  109. 109.

    tc125231

    May 4, 2009 at 10:43 pm

    NEWS FLASH——TYPO AT BALLOON JUICE….
    Will we recover?

    Be still, my heart.

  110. 110.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 10:46 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead: Newman!

  111. 111.

    The Other Steve

    May 4, 2009 at 11:26 pm

    @Corner Stone: You must be new here. John doesn’t allow anyone to speak ill of the dead no matter who died.

  112. 112.

    Corner Stone

    May 4, 2009 at 11:41 pm

    @The Other Steve: Well, relatively new. I showed up during the Dem primaries, mas o menos.
    Are you saying that if we criticized Nicolae Ceauşescu, Cole would bitch out?
    Yeah, I can see that.

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