No one is talking about "normalcy." We're all talking about whether you should be offended or not. goobster didn't quite get to this point, but here it is: if you're competent at what you do, and you want to live a normal life, you're going to find a job where you're paid what you're worth. I have never been so close to voting Republican as when I spent a year dealing with local elected officials. They suck. The guys I'm dealing with cost me an easy $100k through pure incompetence. They're doing their jobs badly and my community is suffering as a consequence. In theory, government belongs to the people who can fix things or at least keep things running. In practice, unless you can attract people who don't suck you're going to get the guys who can't get hired to do anything else. Meanwhile there are regulations upon regulations upon customs upon boobytraps to keep people from profiting while in office. This is right, this is just, this is good. But the regulations that they write and change and advance and rescind and alter and reinforce alter the fundamental flow of commerce and while your senator makes a pretty good dayrate, your county councilman does not. What it comes down to is that our capitalist system handsomely rewards the capitalist lobbyists and capitalist industrialists who want to change the laws, and punishes the socialist bureaucrats and socialist enforcers who carry them out. If governing made a better living than petitioning the government there'd be no tension here... but we're more likely to induct Kapital into the constitution than we are for that to happen. So what we're left with is people howling at the moon that the most powerful man in the world for eight years, the first black president in history, might actually get paid by rich people to talk to them. And make no mistake. ANY amount of money at ANY point from ANYONE would have EVERYONE howling at the moon. There is no scenario in which OB or any of his ilk would not be offended. And that's why this shit pisses me off.
And that's why this shit pisses me off. My very first comment was me agreeing with your first comment and while it doesn't piss me off, per se, I do find it very silly. I think fundamentally, we're in agreement in a lot of ways, and fundamentally, we're in disagreement in a lot of ways. I'm getting angry though, because I mean, as I said to goobster, while I think people are way overreacting about Obama, I do see where they are coming from, I do think their frustration comes from a valid place, and man, I just want to try and figure out whether accepting $400,000 from the same people he rescued from the problems they created themselves is fucky or not and I keep on getting distracted by all of these dumb side arguments that do very little to address that.And make no mistake. ANY amount of money at ANY point from ANYONE would have EVERYONE howling at the moon. There is no scenario in which OB or any of his ilk would not be offended.
What it comes down to is that our capitalist system handsomely rewards the capitalist lobbyists and capitalist industrialists who want to change the laws, and punishes the socialist bureaucrats and socialist enforcers who carry them out. If governing made a better living than petitioning the government there'd be no tension here... but we're more likely to induct Kapital into the constitution than we are for that to happen. So what we're left with is people howling at the moon that the most powerful man in the world for eight years, the first black president in history, might actually get paid by rich people to talk to them.
A moral relativist, I see. I'ma write some headlines for you real quick: "FORMER PRESIDENT OBAMA ACCEPTS NEARLY A HALF MILLION DOLLARS FROM WALL STREET FIRM" "OBAMA TO GIVE CLOSED DOOR SPEECH TO WALL STREET INSIDERS" "OBAMA'S FIRST PAID APPEARANCE TO BE BEFORE FINANCE INDUSTRY" Hang on lemme write a few more "OBAMA TO GIVE SPEECH BEFORE PHILANTHROPISTS" wait where the fuck did that come from ohhhh shit wtf fuck me THAT Cantor Fitzgerald stahp Fuckin' black hats, these guys. Truly the Vampire Squid. Meyer Rothschild in Armani or some shit. Really - the narrative being spun is "people with money giving money to people with money." Fuckin' Jennifer Lopez made a million dollars singing at a Russian mobster's wedding. But oh god - there's money and influence and it's going to Democrats! Everybody freak the fuck out! The reason you're angry is because you're being yelled at. the reason you're being yelled at is you're saying the side argument is the main argument. 99% of the people who are butthurt over this speech don't even know who Cantor Fitzgerald is. They hear "wall street" and go full WHARRGARBL without further thought. But further thought is the place Democrats are supposed to dwell, goddamn it. And for those of us who have voted in more than a couple elections? it's fucking tiresome.I just want to try and figure out whether accepting $400,000 from the same people he rescued from the problems they created themselves is fucky or not
On September 19, Cantor Fitzgerald made a pledge to distribute 25 percent of the firm's profits for the next five years, and committed to paying for ten years of health care, for the benefit of the families of its 658 former Cantor Fitzgerald, eSpeed, and TradeSpark employees (profits which would otherwise have been distributed to the Cantor Fitzgerald partners).[11] In 2006, the company completed its promise, having paid a total of $180 million (and an additional $17 million from a relief fund run by Lutnick's sister, Edie).
The Cantor Fitzgerald Relief Fund provided $10 million to families affected by Hurricane Sandy. Howard Lutnick and the Relief Fund "adopted" 19 elementary schools in impacted areas, distributing $1,000 prepaid debit cards to each family from the schools. In total $10 million in funds were given to families affected by the storm.
Each year, on September 11, Cantor Fitzgerald and its affiliate BGC Partners donate 100% of their revenue to charitable causes on their annual Charity Day which was originally established to raise money to assist the families of Cantor employees who died in the World Trade Center attacks. Since its inception, Charity Day has raised $110 million for charities globally.
Cantor Fitzgerald lost sixty-eight percent of its workforce, considerably more than any of the other World Trade Center tenants or the New York City Police Department, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Police Department, the New York City Fire Department, and the United States Department of Defense. CEO and chairman Howard Lutnick, whose brother was among those killed, vowed to keep the company alive, and the company was able to bring its trading markets back online within a week. On September 19, Cantor Fitzgerald made a pledge to distribute 25 percent of the firm's profits for the next five years, and committed to paying for ten years of health care, for the benefit of the families of its 658 former Cantor Fitzgerald, eSpeed, and TradeSpark employees.
On September 2, 2004, Cantor filed a civil lawsuit against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for allegedly providing money to the hijackers and Al Qaeda, one of a number of organizations to do so. It was later joined in the suit by the Port Authority of New York.