Update: Thanks to calchala, we now know what Obama really said. I guess the quote
I can't believe that there is anybody who is running a business out there who thinks that 60-to-1 leverage and folks making $100 million bonuses based on gambles on derivatives, takes comfort in that kind of system.
isn't sexy when you have to make an attack, regardless of its veracity.
Dear John:
Piss. Off.
I followed that Obama - Business Week interview controversy fairly closely. Have to do something while unemployed and in between feedings of a 4 month old. It erupted on Wednesday, thanks to a screaming misleading headline on HuffPo. Thanks to careful readers of DailyKos who read past the surface, I could read a quote that looked inflammatory and calmed down when I saw it for what it was: An innocuous glittering generality inflated into a huge controversy through fourth-hand spin. Fourth-hand spin that was bought, to my chagrin, by people who should know better, like Paul Krugman.
How relieved I was that through all of yesterday, after all of the debunkings and the efforts to add the context that you weren't buying. That the context made you see that the controversy had much less importance than the original screamers had attached to it. It wasn't covered at all. I thought - good on you for letting crap go.
I thought wrong.
There was the fire ready to burn out, and along you come with a gas can. No effort to read the context - that bonuses should really be tied to performance and that poorly-performing hacks on Wall Street shouldn't be paid like that. Instead, all you did was merely what the pundit told you to do. Effort? Too difficult, I guess. Much easier to just read the press release, especially if it conforms with your own pleasing narratives. Just make sure those pesky facts don't get in.
Krugman had an excuse - he at least made his attack in real time. Wrongheaded, and he refused to retract, but still in real time. You have no such excuse - coming along after the thorough debunkings to throw gas on the fire is, to put it simply, lying. Malicious lying in order to make a political attack and draw attention to yourself.
Well, you got my attention. And here's what it gets you - thanks to your intentionally lying, progressives should really no longer bother with you. Your credibility with me is shot. You deserve to get paid like me for that kind of hackwork. Nothing.
Ta. And piss off.