Bankers Seek to Debunk ‘Imbecile’ Attack on Top 1%

[Huey P. Long]

Bankers Seek to Debunk ‘Imbecile’ Attack on Top 1%
By Max Abelson - Dec 19, 2011

Dimon, 55, whose 2010 compensation was $23 million, joined billionaires including hedge-fund manager John Paulson and Home Depot Inc. (HD) co-founder Bernard Marcus in using speeches, open letters and television appearances to defend themselves and the richest 1 percent of the population targeted by Occupy Wall Street demonstrators.
If successful businesspeople don’t go public to share their stories and talk about their troubles, “they deserve what they’re going to get,” said Marcus, 82, a founding member of Job Creators Alliance, a Dallas-based nonprofit that develops talking points and op-ed pieces aimed at “shaping the national agenda,” according to the group’s website. He said he isn’t worried that speaking out might make him a target of protesters.

“Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” Marcus said. “Are you kidding me?”

---

At a lunch in New York, Stemberg and Allison shared their disdain for Section 953(b) of the Dodd-Frank Act, which requires public companies to disclose the ratio between the compensation of their CEOs and employee medians, according to Allison. The rule, still being fine-tuned by the Securities and Exchange Commission, is “incredibly wasteful” because it takes up time and resources, he said. Stemberg called the rule “insane” in an e-mail to Bloomberg News.
“Instead of an attack on the 1 percent, let’s call it an attack on the very productive,” Allison said. “This attack is destructive.”

---

Income Tripled

The top 1 percent of taxpayers in the U.S. made at least $343,927 in 2009, the last year data is available, according to the Internal Revenue Service. While average household income increased 62 percent from 1979 through 2007, the top 1 percent’s more than tripled, an October Congressional Budget Office report showed. As a result, the U.S. had greater income inequality in 2007 than China or Iran, according to the Central Intelligence Agency’s World Factbook.

Detailed article, full-
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-20/bankers-join-billionaires-to-debunk-imbecile-attack-on-top-1-.html

[Lindsay]

1. "Job Creators Alliance"???

Give me a freaking break.

It's their fantasy world, and we're stuck in the reality fall-out.

(The rest of my reaction to this dreck is not suitable for polite company.)

[Joe Bacon]

4. You bet they're job creators!

The problem is they create all those jobs outside the US!

[kenfrequed]

17. WE should attack them!

After all, the 'job creators alliance' probably has a ton of people that have offshored work and cut their workforce and downsized. They may have just offered us the greatest possible gift to destroying the "job creators" meme once and for all!

[Bolo Boffin]

30. "Job Creators" are always so whiny and fearful, aren't they? n/t

[SixthSense]

2. Bankers produce what, exactly?

Debt? Fraud? Corruption?

The gall of that guy to claim dislike of his kind is an attack on the productive, when his entire line of business is to siphon wealth from the actually productive while producing nothing of value in return, is breathtaking.

[carla]

34. Bankers produce

misery, usury and felony. And bunk. Maybe we should call them "bunkers"?

[trumad]

3. And what was his tax rate on the 23 million.

Let me guess---he makes a 300,000 salary with the rest coming from options, etc.

So let's say he's paying 15 percent if that much on 22 million and change.

AND he's crying?

[DCKit]

6. It's a pre-emptive strike.

They're terrified of having to pay their share.

And, it's not as if they have anywhere to go. Every 1st world country has far higher tax rates than the U.S.. Even if they developed some kind of refuge in some 3rd world hellhole, they'd be living in a bubble, unable to travel, having almost no real security and their access to high-end shops, goods and services would be greatly curtailed.

It would take a matter of months, and they'd be eating each other - Cabin Fever for the Rich.

[Shoe Horn]

8. That's why I laugh when they threaten to leave.

[image][/image]

(...the stingy rich)


And Good Goddamn Riddance!

[TBF]

12. If they want libertarianism send them to Somalia. Personally I'd put my odds on the pirates,

and it would be a very amusing show.

[calimary]

64. Somalia is a perfect place for them. I've been saying that for awhile - about the entire

wrong wing. Somalia is the perfect place for them. No government. A handful of ultra-rich, powerful warlords "run" everything (and own everything - what there is worth owning, that is). No order. No laws. No regulations or oversight. No nothing. TOTAL anarchy. But everybody's certainly armed to the teeth. Tons and tons of poor people but the have-nots have no voice, no representation, and no one who gives a damn about them. Utter heaven! Every teabagger's dream!

I wish we could export them all there. I'm sure they'd have a ball!

[KansDem]

15. I agree...

The next time they "threaten" to leave the US, just say...

1) They moved all our jobs overseas;
2) They moved their swag to secret, offshore tax havens....

So, wha't keeping them here?

GET THE HELL OUT!!!

[Shoe Horn]

32. They want the 'civilized', middle class dependant, artistic and safe environment of America...

...they just don't want to personally contribute anything to it
after they enjoy the fruits of our labor.


Stingy bastards.

[lonestarnot]

35. I love it! Let them get out if they can't pay their fair share fuckwads.

[DonCoquixote]

49. That is why Dubai

Is offering itself as a sort of new haven for the ric h, complete with ultra premium stores and debtor's prisons.

[ProfessionalLeftist]

5. "Productive job creators"

Now we see where the politicians whom these schmucks bought and own get some of their terminology and attitudes - directly from their owners.

Truth is, most the middle class probably work harder than the 1% even know how to, and those same middle-class/poor are primarily the "job creators" - not the mostly idle, pampered, catered-to, rich.

The idea that the poor and middle-class just don't "work as hard" and that's why they're not rich is one of the biggest steaming piles of propaganda we've had rammed down our collective throats for the last 50 or so years.

I don't think so. Them's class warfare fightin' words there. And they're lies. “This attack is destructive” to the 99%.

[Shoe Horn]

7. Holy crap this makes me mad.

'Some imbecile'? WTF? The nerve of these arrogant, greedy bastards.
Anyways, I think he means 'some poor person'. Right? --->Pffffttt.

Look at this friggin clown at 2:15, shouting down some OWS protester asking a
legitimate question with, "hold on hold hold on, it's not your show, monkey!"


Not sure if they're trying to provoke a violent response or what?

[HangOnKids]

45. Good Gawd!

That fucking arrogant BRITISH SHIT calling someone a monkey really pissed me off. How the fuck dare he? What a steaming pile of hubris. A fucking fine example of why the 99% are so fucking pissed off. Sheesh. On edit the guy sounds OZ. Must be a Howard pus soaked shit.

[think]

9. Fuck the bankers and their ill gotten gains

send them to the gallows!

[BeyondGeography]

10. Bernie Marcus...keep flapping your gums, you obnoxious old fool

He'll recruit more people to OWS than any banker.

[6000eliot]

11. What part of they fucked everything up do they not get?

[Dawson Leery]

13. These monsters needed to fail back in 2008.

[Odin2005]

14. These fuckers should have never been bailed out.

[Javaman]

16. One day, we the 99% will dine on their corpse. nt

[HughBeaumont]

18. Bernie Marcus can't get off this planet fast enough for my tastes.

That old son of a bitch and fellow far right bastard fucker Ken Langone (or Linger-On, since only the good die young, apparently) are doing their damnedest to ruin this country all so a bunch of spoiled underworked and vastly overpaid bitch motherfuckers can have theirs.

How did these guys get so much power?

It's no secret one of the reasons is their friends in the media, specifically CNBC. Fellow arch-rightist dickface Joe Kernen has them (and other right wing bastards) on Squawk Box for 1-2 hours uninterrupted, unquestioned so they can very slowly and clearly jabber on and on about how the diaper-bitch one percent (with 9-figure net worths and their own planes, mind you) are just SOOOOOOOOOOOOO ASSHURT by all of these crushing regulations and taxes.

GET the hell out of here with that SHIT.

These people need to be taxed furiously and hard. Investigate their books while you're at it.

See, this is why I can't be president. I'd look these old mothershitters straight in the eye, nose to fucking nose and say "It's over. Your rides are OVER. Your lobbyists are going bye bye, your publicity arms are getting dismantled, your organizations are getting investigated and you're getting taxed. DO you understand?? Now get the hell out of my office before you say something that pisses me off even further."

[Octafish]

21. I'd vote for you.

You wouldn't have to appoint me ambassador to Ireland or no place, either.

[HughBeaumont]

24. All I ask is that you help build the Popemobile with 2-inch glass I'll have to travel in.

Just in case America's itchy-trigger-finger elite decide their new "austerity" isn't to their liking . . .

Doesn't it make you wonder how much all of this is theater? If it's not, why is it that every other industrialized Democratic socialist country that the USA is supposedly "better than" can provide for their people's well-being but an American citizen gets cancer and our entire family is bankrupted? How's come other countries think nothing of treating health care as a human right?

Let's not even get started about wages and pensions and how the US not only tells the middle/working/poor to "embrace a dialing-down of our standard of living" (while the wealthy sacrifices approximately zero) but steers US into the 401k casino while denigrating Social Security. Let's not even get into why the Pentasewer deserves a lion's share of our discretionary budget each and every year for a military that can blow up the Earth 236 times over while the country, its schools and its roads fall apart at the seams.

[Missy Vixen]

23. I need this on a t-shirt

>spoiled underworked and vastly overpaid bitch motherfuckers<

In the meantime, how in the hell are these assholes more "productive" than those at the very bottom of the freaking food chain? Please explain this to me. Why does Jamie Dimon make $23 million a year when the people who clean his office probably make minimum wage, work an 8-12 hour day, EVERY DAY, and have to show they actually did the work in question before getting paid? There's no golden parachute for them if they lose their job due to mismanagement at the top or because they get sick or injured, either.

As for that SOB that insists they need a "job creators' alliance" or whatever, to hell with him. Go back to the mansion and dry your tears on your 1000-thread pillowcase. Those who actually WORK for a living don't care about your "problems"!

[Monk06]

31. That's some quality rant Hugh. It's true the 1% aren't overregulated they're underregulated, as in,

out of control.

[lonestarnot]

36. I love you!

[aletier_v]

19. Blowing up our country with the housing bubble was "destructive"

these guys don't seem to grasp the difference between "making money" and "taking money".

[onehandle]

20. Occupy the 1%'s living rooms. nt

[drm604]

22. Oddly Named Group.

Job Creators Alliance, a Dallas-based nonprofit that develops talking points and op-ed pieces aimed at “shaping the national agenda,” according to the group’s website.

It seems like a group named "Job Creators Alliance" would have "creating jobs" as a main goal. It is in their name after all. Maybe they should be called "Talking Points Alliance", or how about "Bullshit Brigade".

And no Bernard, they are not imbeciles; and statements like “Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” originate from fear and weakness, as do lying assholes propaganda spewing groups such as yours.

[Uncle Joe]

25. Increase in average household income means nothing, it can easily distort reality.

"The top 1 percent of taxpayers in the U.S. made at least $343,927 in 2009, the last year data is available, according to the Internal Revenue Service. While average household income increased 62 percent from 1979 through 2007, the top 1 percent’s more than tripled, an October Congressional Budget Office report showed. As a result, the U.S. had greater income inequality in 2007 than China or Iran, according to the Central Intelligence Agency’s World Factbook."

A 62% increase over 28 years is pathetic but I believe even that is viewing reality through rose colored glasses.

The top 1% tripling of income likely dragged the average up to an illusionary 62%, a much better guide would be how much did the median household income increase over those years?

A median income gauge, exactly half the income producing poplulation making less and half making more would be a much more accurate depiction of how reality is affecting the American People as a whole.

Thanks for the thread, Huey P. Long.

[shanti]

26. the attack is destructive?

GOOD, that's the point!

[SalviaBlue]

27. K&R

[Zorra]

28. It's too late. Their false elitist power center is finished, and they know it.

They know the whole world is always watching them now, waiting to completely strip them of their control of governments, their unequal protections, and their ability to cause massive harm to people and the planet with impunity.

tick...tick...tick...

[Shoe Horn]

33. Be still my heart!

I can only hope you're not whistlin' Dixie.

They are a large, and entrenched power structure though, the strongest in the world, in all the history of the world... so it'll take many, many years to reign them in completely, if it's possible, I feel.


Hope the American people are up to it.
The world will benefit.

[raouldukelives]

29. Typical Wall Street attitude

Who cares about raping the environment? Not us! I've stuffed my pockets with gold made from stealing life from future children. It's awesome! Every time a family is snuffed out by a drone strike my 401k makes a nickel! Hooray!

[primavera]

37. Typical aristocracy attitude

Who gives a crap about the peasants? Let them eat cake!

[Quantess]

38. Banksters are some of the least productive members of society!

They are like ticks, getting fat off their host.

Compare that to the productivity of a worker who actually does work, ie; a nurse, firefighter, plumber, teacher, etc.....

[Shoe Horn]

47. Shuffles papers, squeezes workers, collects huge profits.

Reminds me of a few bosses I've had, show up one a month to review how much money their business is making, then it's off the Bahamas. Must be nice, I wouldn't know, seems pretty fucking cushy to me.

Not sure how anyone in that particular position is complaining.

[Zalatix]

39. K&R, turn up the heat

Let's give them more, and more, and more to whine about.

[Huey P. Long]

40. Yes, if they aren't crying, we aren't doing what needs to be done! -eom

[ieoeja]

41. And this is why we think the bankers are imbeciles.

"At a lunch in New York, Stemberg and Allison shared their disdain for Section 953(b) of the Dodd-Frank Act, which requires public companies to disclose the ratio between the compensation of their CEOs and employee medians, according to Allison. The rule, still being fine-tuned by the Securities and Exchange Commission, is “incredibly wasteful” because it takes up time and resources, he said."


SELECT AVG(salary) FROM payrollorbenefitstable WHERE status = 'Active'

That took me a couple seconds to write. Wow was that an incredible waste of time and resources.


I have had four jobs within my career. Without a question the only place I worked where incompetence was nearly 100% from the top to the bottom was the one international bank at which I worked.

[grasswire]

42. is there a problem with this stat?

"While average household income increased 62 percent from 1979 through 2007,"

I don't believe that. Through the Bush years?

How much did the average household income increase from 1979 through 2001?

That is the statistic I want to see, to compare with what they have written above.

[HughBeaumont]

46. I find that problematic as well. Real wages haven't risen since 1979.

The evidence is overwhelming.

Could it be they're counting more instances of two incomes in one household, whereas it used to just be one?

Before Reagan, many homes were just one income.

Since the tax cut-o-rama as a substitute for flat wages, that scenario has changed dramatically.

[grasswire]

48. I'm calling bogus on it.

Someone ought to do the footwork and fact check it.

[Ship of Fools]

56. Big Ed's *chart* has that percentage at 18, fwiw.

[grasswire]

59. household income increased 18 percent?

Can you point me to Big Ed's chart?

Thanks much.

[Ship of Fools]

61. Hi! He refers to it

as 18% *increase* in wages ... Sorry about the link -- I'm technologically impaired ...

If this doesn't work, google *Ed Schultz trickle down*

[Huey P. Long]

43. Bankers, Billionaires Try to Form Movement Against OWS

Bankers, Billionaires Try to Form Movement Against OWS
—By Asawin Suebsaeng| Wed Dec. 21, 2011 9:47 AM


Whaddaya know? It seems the rich now want to eat the folks who want to eat the rich. Wrap your head around this Bloomberg report:

Jamie Dimon, the highest-paid chief executive officer among the heads of the six biggest U.S. banks, turned a question at an investors' conference in New York this month into an occasion to defend wealth.

"Acting like everyone who's been successful is bad and because you're rich you're bad, I don't understand it," the JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) CEO told an audience member who asked about hostility toward bankers. "Sometimes there's a bad apple, yet we denigrate the whole."

Dimon, 55, whose 2010 compensation was $23 million, joined billionaires including hedge-fund manager John Paulson and Home Depot Inc. (HD) co-founder Bernard Marcus in using speeches, open letters and television appearances to defend themselves and the richest 1 percent of the population targeted by Occupy Wall Street demonstrators.

full=
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/12/bankers-billionaires-try-form-movement-against-occupy-wall-street

[Huey P. Long]

44. Dear Jamie Dimon,

Dear Jamie Dimon,

I hope this note finds you well.

I am writing to profess my utter disbelief at how little you seem to understand the current mood of the nation. In a story at Bloomberg today, you and a handful of fellow banker and billionaire "job creators" were quoted as believing that the horrific sentiment directed toward you from virtually all corners of America had something to do with how much money you had. I'd like to take a moment to disabuse you of this foolishness.

America is different than almost every other place on earth in that its citizenry reveres the wealthy and we are raised to believe that we can all one day join the ranks of the rich. The lack of a caste system or visible rungs of society's ladder is what separates our empire from so many fallen empires throughout history. In a nation bereft of royalty by virtue of its republican birth, the American people have done what any other resourceful people would do - we've created our own royalty and our royalty is the 1%. Not only do we not "hate the rich" as you and other em-bubbled plutocrats have postulated, in point of fact, we love them. We worship our rich to the point of obsession. The highest-rated television shows uniformly feature the unimaginably fabulous families of celebrities not to mention the housewives (real or otherwise) of the rich. We don't care what color they are or what religion they practice or where in the country they live or what channel their show is on - if they're rich, we are watching.

--

What we hate are the people who we view as having found their success as a consequence of the damage their activities have done to our country. What we hate are those who take and give nothing back in the form of innovation, convenience, entertainment or scientific progress. We hate those who've exploited political relationships and stupidity to rake in even more of the nation's wealth while simultaneously driving the potential for success further away from the grasp of everyone else.

--

America hates unjustified privilege, it hates an unfair playing field and crony capitalism without the threat of bankruptcy, it hates privatized gains and socialized losses, it hates rule changes that benefit the few at the expense of the many and it hates people who have been bailed out and don't display even the slightest bit of remorse or humbleness in the presence of so much suffering in the aftermath.



full-
http://www.thereformedbroker.com/2011/12/20/dear-jamie-dimon/

[Ruby the Liberal]

50. "let’s call it an attack on the very productive" LOL! Actually no,

it is 'creating a job'.

[underpants]

51. “incredibly wasteful” because it takes up time and resources - I can figure that out in about 2 min.

given basic internal company data.....and a calculator



IN FACT their payroll services provider (they probably have one) most likely would to that for them...or their auditors

[sarcasmo]

52. Robber Barrons alliance.

[sarcasmo]

53. Job creators a new spin on trickle down.

[Jack Rabbit]

54. What productive people are they attacking?

This country had its golden age when productive people had an easier time joining labor unions.

[Mosaic]

55. They are losing, name calling children

Once your enemy resorts to name calling you know you are winning the fight.

[sarcasmo]

62. +1

[lunatica]

57. If they have nothing to hide then they should welcome full disclosure

They should also disclose how many jobs they've created and what kind of benefits their new employees are getting since they call themselves job creators. Surely they've created jobs, right? Right...?

edited to add more

[guitar man]

58. "job creators" my ass

The recently released census data shows that 1 out of every 2 Americans is either poor or low income...many of us teetering on the brink, hanging on by our fingernails.

30 years after Reagan started this shit, anybody that could still believe the tripe these bastards are shoveling is just willfully ignorant. Hopefully fewer and fewer will swallow the propaganda of how "we all benefit from their privelege " and we can start to bring these bastards down.

[aquart]

60. If the greedy, UNPATRIOTIC rich wish to leave, fine.

Whatever they can pack in a suitcase plus $1 million. Vaya con dios.

[HarryPowell]

63. Tax Until It Hurts--Ronald Reagan nt.