If Abramovich is an ‘oligarch,’ then can we start calling US bankers ‘oligarchs’ too?

May 15th, 2009 by stacyherbert

Stacy Summary:   Let’s just call bankers ‘oligarchs.’  I mean, the MSM always refer to the likes of Abramovich, for example, as ‘Russian oligarch.’  He is never referred to as a ‘Russian businessman.’  So, why not the same treatment for Goldman Sachs or JP Morgan bankers?

Updates:

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24 responses so far ↓

  • Scott from Oregon
    May 15, 2009 at 9:04 am

    Nomenclature is tough.

    “Banksters” has a nice ring to it. But “Hedgers” is a bit flat. I am partial to “pigmen” myself.

    Oligarch fits a few of these pigmen- quite a few- but not all.

    Hmmm…

    Can’t we just call them all “pricks with ears”?

  • Youri Carma
    May 15, 2009 at 9:42 am

    I suggest Banksters like in Gangsters.

  • Mep
    May 15, 2009 at 10:01 am

    @ Youri, I still like Max’s “financial terrorists.”

    Yesterday, Bank of America sent me and my fiance applications for credit cards. I’m going to write them a nice note–in which I tell them then that I don’t do business with financial terrorists–and send it back. On my fiance’s application, I’ll probably mention BoA’s use of taxpayer money to lobby against the Employee Free Choice Act, and tell them that they don’t deserve to be on the receiving end of business from a unionized teacher.

  • Rich
    May 15, 2009 at 10:36 am

    …all soon to be better known as ‘Convicted Felons’.

  • Youri Carma
    May 15, 2009 at 10:50 am

    @Mep I agree that Banksters isn’t very original and doesn’t fit the bill completely. It just sounded good.Better Gansters or Financial terrorist indeed. Oligarchs gets my throat hurten better The Monopoly Man. Maybe the Brotherhood? The Molug Cabal.

    The Inbreds is my best shot for todayl.

    Read about bank tariffs:The $1,500 Frisbee; http://bit.ly/11Wepj

  • bzmoore
    May 15, 2009 at 12:34 pm

    I’m with Mep. ‘Finanical’ Terrorists works great.

    Words can be so powerful. An example of this is ‘Palestinian’ Terrorists a great word play by the Israelis. Used for 50 years to paint a downtrodden, marginalized, beaten, ghettoized, weak, robbed, poor people as something other than downtrodden, marginalized, beaten, ghettoized, weak, robbed, poor, people.

  • Mep
    May 15, 2009 at 1:12 pm

    @ bzmoore, I agree. What’s more than that, where there are real terrorists, they are more likely than not the product of abject poverty. One reason (of the many reasons) that I fear for my fellow citizens is because in places where high levels of economic inequality exist, radical ideologies & fundamentalism take root fairly quickly. Already in the US, cults are on the rise as is the degree of religious fundamentalism.

    But to get back to terminology, I just started reading Naomi Klein’s Shock Doctrine, and learned some of the terms that different countries use to refer to the players in the alliance between corporations and the state:

    Russia- oligarchs
    China- princelings
    Chile- the piranhas
    US (specifically, the Bush-Cheney campaign)- Pioneers (News to me.)

  • Mep
    May 15, 2009 at 1:21 pm

    @YRC- Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. How many of these c*cksuckers are scaling back on top pay to CEOs and management? Gotta love how he refers to “the pension issue.” The real “pension issue” is going to be the crisis with the PBGC after more and more corporations kick their pension obligations into it.

  • M
    May 15, 2009 at 1:24 pm

    This SEC article is outragious! What a shame.

  • Don (Joe bag O chickens)
    May 15, 2009 at 1:26 pm

    @ Sharon

    Well I’ll be damn! You may have made some waves with phone calls and letters.

    “Police to look at MP allegations”
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8052709.stm

  • Andrew
    May 15, 2009 at 1:41 pm

    There is a little hope for THE PEOPLE. Maybe THE PEOPLE will take matters into their own hands and duplicate this:

    http://www.democracynow.org/2009/5/15/argentine_journalist_sergio_ciancaglini_on_sin

  • Mr Supergeek
    May 15, 2009 at 2:17 pm

    I jokingly called Max an ‘economedian’ once, maybe a more negative spin on the word could be ‘economaniac’……..

  • Bill Stewart
    May 15, 2009 at 2:24 pm

    You cannot get a job at the US FTC unless it is via favoritism and nepotism — in fact failing to engage in “Insider Trading” will get you fired rather quickly.

    If the UK “white colonies” of Australia, Canada and NZ there are actual punishments for insider dealing. However, this lack of total corruption in these colonies has more to do with ensuring these colonies have functioning economies regardless of the sickness of the mother country.

  • Rian Orr
    May 15, 2009 at 2:31 pm

    Call them what you will, I prefer the tried and tested, FCs, the ruling class, regard it as, as necessary to destroy the emergent middle class upstarts as much as they desire the total suborbination of the mass of the population.

    Everyone must be controled and everyone must serve. The middle class people I have met live a world of delusion, thinking that they are valued and must be preserved. No wonder the are looking for one last desparate out. I have no sympathy for their plight. Pathethic hypocrits to a man/woman.

    I dont know where Max / Stacey fit into this but lately Max sounds like a good old ‘Ranter’ and that’s good enough for me.

  • Giuseppe Bagodonutti
    May 15, 2009 at 3:42 pm

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/14/AR2009051404241.html

    Woo hoo !!!
    BUY AMERICAN!!!
    looks like the USA wants a trade war with Canada.
    Isn’t that fantastic???
    I can understand the desire for the USA to create more “stuff” with the MADE IN THE USA label…
    but come on…
    if something is MADE in the states,
    who cares where the raw materials come from.
    It’s not like the USA has much in the way of resources.

    Unless you count the nations it occupies or tries to control…
    I can’t wait to see how fast the Lesbian Cowboy Harper runs to the WTO over this crap…

  • Youri Carma
    May 15, 2009 at 6:23 pm

    Getting the feeling that the shit might be hitting the fan sooner than expected like in an economy worse than expected. I heard that countries are demanding their physical gold stored elsewhere like Germany in the U.S. Can or will they deliver?

  • Don (Joe bag O chickens)
    May 15, 2009 at 6:33 pm

    @bzmoore

    You make an ugly point so eloquent. I, as an “American” am ashamed of what the mega money war machine has done to the people of my own country and those of the world. In the US being blood thirsty and racist is seen as being a patriot. I hope that as Humans, we can evolve from Humans Doing too Human Beings.
    And I pray for the Palestinians and all people of Earth. We have such great potential if only it could be unleashed.

  • smdqr
    May 15, 2009 at 6:33 pm

    Paul Craig Roberts calls them Financial gangsters.

    Some progressive commentators have called him oligarchs.

    They all apply. Parasites is another good description.

  • Spookwaffe
    May 15, 2009 at 7:38 pm

    Yo, M& S

    can I donate a song to you?

    I think you might be interested in using it in one or more of you vids.

  • sharon
    May 16, 2009 at 4:03 am

    @Don Joe (bag O chickens). Yep, and they should all go to jail in my view. I mean, what a p*ss take! Bloody massage chair! Cleaning out someone’s moat or swimming pool and claiming for mortgages that didn’t exist! What a joke! I don’t think I can take credit for the police investigation though, I think I was one of many, many people who contacted the police. The British people are disgusted by the behaviour of their MP’s, for a number of reasons but this last just take the biscuit. The media are saying that this could lead to the dissolving of Parliament.
    I am very suspicious regarding the agenda on this one. In my experience the msm do not run with anything unless they’re allowed to, so there must be a reason for this. The robber baron’s usual MO is to cause chaos and in that they are succeeding. It could be that they want to get rid of Parliament and replace it with something else or force us in to Europe lock, stock and barrel. The other possibility is that Lord Black, the owner of the newspaper that broke the story wanted his revenge against the politicians and the robber barons because they scapegoated him (he is currently sat in a US prison serving a 7 year sentence). Anyway, we’ll see what happens but I don’t think it’s gonna go away and people have said they’re not voting for any of them in the next election. In fact I think someone said they’d rather see them all hung from lamp posts. Now that would be a sight worth seeing.

    @Rian Orr,
    You’re right. My Mom has always said they’re keeping us in our place.

    @Giuseppe. It could be protectionism or it could be a similar con to the one played on Europe back in the 70s when we were told that signing up to join Europe was purely based on trade – turns out they lied.

  • Max Power
    May 18, 2009 at 2:23 pm

    HEADLINE

    “Regulators failing to dea with banker welfare recipients in same rigorous manner as other corporate bailouts”

    should read

    “Regulators failing to deal with banker welfare recipients in same rigorous manner as other corporate bailouts”

  • “migration in the cyber space” « Media war
    May 24, 2009 at 9:14 am

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