American Banks, American Ingenuity

If given the choice between fat profits and bonuses or little pipi paychecks and a used sedan, obese and undereducated Americans have overwhelmingly chosen the former. Not for themselves or for their barely middle class neighbors, but for the people at the top of the economic ladder who just wouldn't feel right letting people at their Country Club think that they didn't earn a $3 million bonus this year. After all, where would America be today if rich bankers couldn't summon the "cojones" to make shitty loans to Joe Taxpayer, repackage these loans and sell them to Joe's $500,000 a year pension and mutual fund managers, and finally, borrow the money back from Joe's Social Security and Medicare Trust Fund to shore up some cash to foreclose on Joe's house?

Subprime lending and outsized risk-taking isn't a reflection of eroding American values, it's just our little way of letting the world know that we don't give a fuck. The way the game works is simple: American banks borrows money from depositors, taxpayers, and a privately owned Federal Reserve Bank with no intention of ever paying it back, and occasionally, when the banks get a bill asking for the balance, they use the bill to prove that they need another larger loan just to keep making interest payments; otherwise, dad will lose his job, mom won't have the money to get her tits done and divorce dad, Jr. won't be able to bang a co-ed while attending college, and Susie will have to prostitute herself to earn enough money to buy a new Coach purse. It's like binge-eating at Smith and Wollensky's after ordering 7 bottles of their most expensive wine, and then announcing to the waiter that you don't have any money to pay the check, but wouldn't mind a slice of key lime pie before dipping your balls in his mouth and retiring for the evening. What could be more American that?