The economic monstrosity: looking for a villain

The CEO of what's left of Lehman Brothers testified before a Congressional panel yesterday, and we can see more Gothic touches seeping into the conversation. 

The purpose was to find a bad person, according to the New York Times:

Representative John L. Mica, Republican of Florida... informed Mr. Fuld at one point that he needed to understand his role as the designated “villain” of the day.

Contempt for Fuld apparently was open:

Members of the committee, several of whom mispronounced Mr. Fuld’s name as “Fold” or “Food,”

But contempt came right back from Mr Fuld - just look at that face:

Already protesters are appearing.  And the need for bodyguards:

After the hearing — which started before a crowd of journalists and a smattering of protesters, then ended almost five hours later before a half-full room — a weary-looking Mr. Fuld approached Mr. Waxman and said he hoped his testimony was helpful. He then left under protection from Capitol Police officers, going to a waiting sport utility vehicle while members of the protest group Code Pink pelted him with insults and called for Mr. Fuld to be jailed.

If this economic monstrosity makes more of us into peasants, we've got torches and pitchforks ready to go.

Comments

[Bryan Alexander]

And already people take things into their own hands:

“From two very senior sources – one incredibly senior source – that he went to the gym after … Lehman was announced as going under. He was on a treadmill with a heart monitor on. Someone was in the corner, pumping iron and he walked over and he knocked him out cold. And frankly after having watched this, I’d have done the same too.”
http://consumerist.com/5060063/lehman-brothers-ceo-got-punched-in-the-face

[Alexandra Kitty]

Oh, there are plenty of villains -- the luxury addicts posing as successful businessmen, their underlings who turned a blind eye because they thought that they too could be big and greedy, the press, who thought that Amy Winehouse's decline was more newsworthy than those silly suits who hold the reigns of power, and of course, politicians who were having puerile schoolyard catfights with their ideological opponents.

It's a Penny Dreadful -- so many dislikable villains to throw rotten tomatoes at guilt-free -- but none as charming or charismatic as a Sweeney Todd...

[Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc.]

Villains of the current financial panic should include Alan Greenspan, who consistently thwarted federal regulation of risky derivitives, instead trusting Wall Street to regulate itself. To do otherwise, he insisted, might cause chaos. Compared to him, Fuld was just a cardshark with a poor sense of when to fold.