SNOT-NOSED TEENAGERS WITH UNLIMITED POWER

Jsmes Kwak on the Wall Streeters:

Wall Street CEOs like to think they are the adults, the big men in the room, the ones who know how the world works. Well, you know what? They screwed up their own banks, the financial system, and the economy like a bunch of two-year-olds.

Which inspires this from Digby:

This is exactly right. I think the frat house, riverboat gambling atmosphere has attracted a certain kind of person --- an emotionally stunted, irresponsible, immature sort of fellow who simply refuses to accept that there are any limits to his behavior and who insists on blaming everyone else for his failures. A spoiled, reckless, bully.And all the people supposedly in charge are worried that if we don't allow these adolescent monsters to have free rein they will destroy us all.

In other words they are simply, rich teenage gang members in pin stripes. And they are way more dangerous to the fate of this nation than the crips and the bloods.

Two-year-olds? Two-year-olds vacillate from tantrum behavior to remarkable curiosity about the world. They learn, they absorb, they grow. Wall Street Masters of the Universe don't do that.

Frat boys? Riverboat gamblers? Frat boys, for all their immaturity and for all the indulgence they expect of everyone around them, at least take some responsibility for sustaining a sort of social order. Riverboat gamblers generally risk only their own money.

Gang members? Bullies? They at least go face-to-face with their victims.

I wouldn't accord Wall Street CEOs as much respect as I do any of these groups, even gangbangers and bullies. I don't think they're even as admirable as the brattiest two-year-old.

They're none of these. They're spoiled, snot-nosed high school BMOCs who take responsibility for nothing, give nothing back, and just do whatever the hell they want with no thought to the effect any of it will have on anyone else. Even a gangbanger has a belief about the morality of killing a member of a rival gang. A Wall Street CEO can't even think about other people.

Wall Street CEOs are like spoiled teens who just leave their dirty clothes lying around and don't even notice the fact that Mom does their wash. Then, because they're BMOCs whose parents will get them out of any jam, they go out with their friends for a night of vandalism because what reason do they have not to? They're not doing it because they have anything against their victims -- they do it because it feels good, and because they can, and because they know they'll get away with it and be allowed to do it again and again.

If they hated us, if they wanted to subjugate us, that would at least show that they have a belief that life is a war and they want to win it. That might be a repulsive life code, but it would be some sort of belief system.

They don't even have that. They just want any pleasure any time they want it, and they assume there'll be no consequences no matter what happens to anyone as a result of what they do. They can't even think about other people. It's not a personality disorder. It's just an astonishingly indulged adolescence, extended until it's lifelong.