Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Money, money, money
I'm motivated by money, but I'm not fond of being bound by it. Money is paradoxical. It simultaneously frees us and fetters us. This bit from the movie Office Space illustrates both sides of the paradox:
PETER: Lawrence, what would you do if you had a million dollars?
LAWRENCE: I'll tell you what I'll do, man--Two chicks at the same time.
PETER: That's it? If you had a million dollars, that's what you'd do, two chicks at the same time?
LAWRENCE: Damn straight, man. I've always wanted to do that. I figure if I were a millionaire, I could hook that up. Chicks dig guys with money.
PETER: Well not all chicks….
LAWRENCE: Well, the type that double up on a guy like me do.
PETER: Good point.
LAWRENCE: NOW, WHAT WOULD YOU DO?
PETER: Besides two chicks at the same time?
LAWRENCE: Oh yeah.
PETER: Nothing.
LAWRENCE: Nothing, huh?
PETER: I would relax, I would sit on my ass all day, I would do nothing.
LAWRENCE: You don't need a million dollars to do nothing, man. Take a look at my cousin. He's broke and don't do shit.
Up here in ski country bums are better known as couch surfers. Instead of scrounging through litter they scour the parking lots looking to nab a free lift ticket from someone leaving early and when they get one they are just as apt to resell it as they are to hit the slopes. There are real bums too, living in shanties up in the national forest lands, though they have to be completely crazy to homeless in such a hostile climate when they could hop a freight down to a warmer latitude. It's a subtle difference between the bohemian and the bum. This is depicted well in the movie Joe Gould's Secret, a true account of a bum who's supposedly has devoted his life to writing "An Oral History of Our Times", which turns out to be a long running scam to get handouts from the New York City's elite and art crowd.
In all the Mafioso movies it strikes me how enslaved the characters are to the money. They have nice things—in the movies—but they are not at all free. But, the greed extreme is best epitomized by those closest to Wall Street. Hardly anywhere else can there be found an example of people so addicted to money and so willing to do anything to get it. Balance to them on the whole is not one of morals, but tends toward the maximizing their own money intake, while minimizing the chances of getting caught cheating other people out of theirs.
Just because someone important says something about the markets doesn't make it true. The more idolized a person is the more skeptical I am. It's not that I'm inherently distrustful of successful people. Quite the opposite. I admire success and achievement greatly. Rather I am distrustful of the masses blind penchant for idolatry and the ability of those being idolized to manage the power they are provided in a honest, moralistic, and forthright manner.
posted at 4:04 PM
