Shuffle, Kick, Shuffle

Having paid its requisite lip service to the public option that probably won’t see the light of day in any recognizable form, the Obama administration is now genuflecting at the altar of financial regulation. Like most genuflects, it is a knee-jerk reaction devoid of meaning.

These theatrics are necessary to placate an increasingly restive public that is beginning to realize that it’s been scammed into believing that Wall Street, the Pentagon and the Beltway are America when, in fact, they are alien entities inimical to all we stand for. Their goal is to transform America into a country that is foreign unto herself.

The keystone of the reform proposal is to require banks deemed too big to fail to prepare living wills, which are action plans that will facilitate their winding down the next time they plunge us into another financial crisis. In theory, these plans are to list the amount and location of all the banks toxic assets that would be defaulted on in the event the bank went under.

That is: the plan would list the toxic assets except for those excluded under the various and assorted loopholes that would turn any reform bill into a slice of Swiss cheese. It’s kind of like letting a criminal sentence himself.

Financial reform is simply a Mother Goose story that is the product of a larger metanarrative. There will be no comprehensive financial regulatory legislation passed just as no meaningful healthcare reform is going to see the light of day because:

When the Soviet Union collapsed, our oligarchs formed a corporate conga line and started kick-shuffling themselves right back to the nineteenth century, choreographed by that master of empathy Bill “I feel your pain” Clinton to music scored and arranged by Ronald “Mourning in America” Regan.

Congress quickly joined the line as it shuffled, kicked and pocketed large checks at the same time in an amazing display of manual dexterity.

It’s tricky. Gotta keep the natives placated so our overlords can party on. Gotta get them to clap time to the music.

They’re getting restless, though, as they are forced out of their homes and into the backseats of the cars they’re hiding from the repo man.

Not a problem. Just launch another million-dollar media blitz convincing them the impoverishment is prosperity just as they’ve been taught war is security. Anything as long as we can keep that shuffle-kick in motion.