Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Matt Levine on what Cantor is buying:

Speaking of important people, why is Cantor Fitzgerald LP paying Barack Obama $400,000 to speak at its health care conference? The obvious answer is that Obama is a huge popular celebrity and an excellent speaker who will attract and impress clients at the conference, but that answer is so obvious that people seem to want to read a corrupt motive into it. Paying a former president a six-figure fee for a speech seems like a pretty oblique way to persuade future politicians to be "soft on Wall Street" or whatever, and a very straightforward way to get a good speech, but here we are.

Dan Davies thinks they want a good speech. "The fact that there is genuinely relevant business content there means that you can market the event to clients in a way that would be much more difficult for a day at the races, or front-row tickets to a pop concert," he notes, and having a famous speaker can "make the clients feel important, and burnish the image of the banker who organised the event as someone who is at ease in the corridors of power." Also:

The reason that we can be sure that these payments are not purely transactional is that nothing in investment banking is purely transactional. Across fields from advisory to research to capital markets, bankers are used to working on spec, building relationships and trust, and eventually getting paid at the time of a big transaction. This is not a transparent pricing model, and for that reason it is generally hated by regulators. It is, however, a very elegant emergent solution to a serious problem of information economics — the fact that it is impossible to tell whether a piece of content or advice is worth paying for without consuming it. The relationship model lets clients “try before they buy”, at the expense of breaking the connection between any particular piece of service and any particular piece of revenue.

Investment banking is a gift economy in which banks give clients an array of thoughtful but random gifts -- free financial modeling, revolving loan facilities, introductions to potential board and executive hires, the chance to meet Barack Obama -- in the hopes that one day the clients will give them the massive gift of a merger advisory mandate. Of course one concern is that this "uniquely bankerish way to do business" will rub off on politicians too. Davies is surely right that Cantor Fitzgerald is hiring Obama to impress its clients, not to influence regulation. But might some politician observe the transaction and decide to give Wall Street a few gifts while he's in office, in the hopes of one day receiving something in return?

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Matt Levine on what Cantor is buying:

So sayeth a guy on a billionaire's payroll.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Matt Levine on what Cantor is buying:

The message this sends to people of color:

https://theestablishment.co/the-far-...s-90194cfddba6

TM

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

The message this sends to people of color:

https://theestablishment.co/the-far-...s-90194cfddba6

TM

Have we seen any person of color or woman, other than Liz Warren, attack Obama for this?

I know, I know, women and people of color are all "establishment"* folks so they don't count.



* For Republicans, replace "establishment" with "pussies and goat-humpers". See, the Berners are much more civil in their bigotry. Progress!

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Finally, someone who can talk to Bernie/Trump voters in language they'll understand

[Tyrone Slothrop]

This. And somehow it's her fault.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

This. And somehow it's her fault.

Yup. 100x.

One of my favorites from yesterday was Glenn Thrush's reaction to a speech in which Hillary said point blank that she accepted responsibility for the loss and discussed the many causes. He tweets four points, one of which was along the lines of "it's everyone's fault but hers", the exact opposite of what she said (but, of course, it's the Thrush's NYT's position, its everyone's fault but theirs).

Misogyny was the most looked up word in Webster's yesterday.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Yup. 100x.

One of my favorites from yesterday was Glenn Thrush's reaction to a speech in which Hillary said point blank that she accepted responsibility for the loss and discussed the many causes. He tweets four points, one of which was along the lines of "it's everyone's fault but hers", the exact opposite of what she said (but, of course, it's the Thrush's NYT's position, its everyone's fault but theirs).

Misogyny was the most looked up word in Webster's yesterday.

That's disheartening, as "automation" should hold that title by many multiples of its closest challenger.

I'm not downplaying the seriousness of misogyny. But we're engaged in conversation regarding asteroids at the cost of neglecting a planet sized pile of economic problems and environmental concerns barreling toward us.

Maybe it's time we wake up and stop allowing the tail (real, but still secondary social issues) to stop wagging the dog in terms of policy debate? Maybe use Maslow's Hierarchy as a start:

First we talk economics, which controls everything (and we stop dithering around tired talking-point solutions like 'education,' and directly address automation);
Then we get to civil rights - most notably the emergence of a police state within our borders;
Next on to the environmental crisis (anyone else notice summer came two months early this year?);
Then on to privacy rights, as in the right not to be spied on by domestic agencies, and a woman's absolute right to make all decisions regarding her body AND any fetus within it.

After we tear through all of those, I think it's time to debate the crisis of flyover state misogynists. I'm not saying it isn't problem. I'm saying it appears to me, that if I wanted to divide and conquer people, and keep them from the discussing the more immediate and dire issues, it's the kind of subject I'd encourage the masses to argue.

We need to prioritize a bit better in this country. We allow ourselves to be divided and conquered on so many secondary matters and rarely discuss the really serious shit. Seeing so much ink spilled on the issues lower down the ladder of importance reminds me of listening to gold bugs. One can't help thinking, "If the possible events of which you're so concerned occur, gold won't be worth shit... the currency will be seeds and bullets." If we don't address automation and the environment, in the not too distant future, debating whether a head of state acquired that position via sexism or unfairness of the media will be the most decadent of parlor conversations.

[SEC_Chick]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Yup. 100x.

One of my favorites from yesterday was Glenn Thrush's reaction to a speech in which Hillary said point blank that she accepted responsibility for the loss and discussed the many causes. He tweets four points, one of which was along the lines of "it's everyone's fault but hers", the exact opposite of what she said (but, of course, it's the Thrush's NYT's position, its everyone's fault but theirs).

Misogyny was the most looked up word in Webster's yesterday.

I love the perspective from Earth 2.

You must have seen a different interview than I did. She said she takes responsibility for the loss, but failed to attribute it in any way to her own campaign/strategy/staff. To "I was on the way to winning until the Russians and Comey interfered and speculation regarding collusion." was the gist of it.

She won the popular vote. It seems implausible to me that the Comey letter swung blue collar whites in three states enough to cost her the election, more than say, failure to even visit such state. Even more so given the testimony today that Weiner's computer did in fact have classified information on it that came from Hillary's server.