Even Meaner Funnies

"I have no issue with paying taxes and whatever needs to be done for my country to grow. I believe very firmly that my ability to sit here — I'm a black man who didn't go to college, yet I get to travel around the world and sell my movies, and I believe very firmly that America is the only place on Earth that I could exist," Smith said. "So I will pay anything that I need to pay to keep my country growing."

That's when the interviewer mentioned that France could have a 75 percent tax rate on income over one million Euros.

 "Seventy-five?" ("Men in Black" actor Will) Smith gasped. "Yeah, that's different, that's different. Yeah, 75. Well, you know, God bless America."

Click on this one for the larger, more readable version. It's worth it.

Defriending Facebook

I spent much of the past couple of weeks posting status updates to my Facebook timeline castigating the social network's initial public stock offering, which came down Friday. Here's a sample:

-- Four ways the IPO will change Facebook forever: 1. More ads. 2. Ads on your mobile. 3. Less privacy. 4. More FB-generated content.

-- FB testing a feature that charges you to send messages to your friends: It's called 'Highlight' and it's currently live in New Zealand. See, not everyone sees all your posts; just the ones that FB's algorithm decides to publish in their -- not yours, theirs -- feed. So you can pay extra to make sure everyone sees a specific post. Maybe.

Or you can just send them a free e-mail.

Here's more on why using FB is soon going to be costing you money.

-- Facebook changes their privacy policy yet again. Hint: it's not to provide you more privacy, or even more control over what little privacy you still have.

-- Nine ways criminals use Facebook.

-- Deleting a FB app doesn't delete your data from their system. This is probably a good time to be reminded that everything you upload to FB -- and I mean everything-- becomes their property. Not yours. Theirs.

-- FB users 'like' and 'share' too much, according to Consumer Reports. And it's not just college kids on spring break intoxicated and partially nude. That post you liked about diabetes? Your insurer is able to purchase that data from FB, and they probably aren't going to do so to help you manage yours.

-- So given all that, would you be surprised that a majority of its users don't trust Facebook?

More than 40 percent of American adults log in to the site — to share news, personal observations, photos and more — at least once a week. In all, some 900 million people around the world are users. But many of them don’t have a very high opinion of Facebook or trust it to keep their information private.

-- Or would you be more surprised that despite that, Facebookers aren't quitting on them?

Those links are what I posted to FB just from last week alone. Truth to tell, I wanted to see if it was possible to get FB to defriend me on the basis of this criticism. Turns out the answer is no, so far at least.

But as you might imagine, this bevy of bad news gave some negative momentum to Friday's initial public offering.

-- 5 reasons not to 'like' FB's IPO.

-- Warren Buffet stayed far away.

-- The AP's finance writer said just don't do it.

-- There are some other dirty little secrets.

-- HuffPo established the Tech Bubble Death Watch in honor of Facebook's IPO.

-- At $38 per share, the stock was valued at over 100 times earnings. That compares with Apple's 14 times, and  Google's 19 times. Thus the headlines Friday became 'overvalued' and 'under-demanded'. And in case you needed a refresher course on the 'level playing field' for small investors...

It's as if no one at Facebook ever heard of MySpace.

Yes, FB is limping into Monday, where the share price could dip below Friday's closing of $38.63, and with a summer bear market rearing its head. I suppose that last is good news if you're a contrarian.

I would be interested to know how my posts about Facebook and their myriad of fuck-ups affected the FB algorithm for what my interests are. I doubt whether Markie Z will be sharing that with me. Besides he'll be busy honeymooning for a few weeks.

Wonder if the newlyweds are scouting domiciles in Singapore?

Update: Oh, there were some techno-difficulties at the NASDAQ on Friday morning, providing a convenient scapegoat for the lack of momentum.

Despite hours of testing, Nasdaq failed to detect a problem with the way the trading system processed order cancellations. Greifeld said Nasdaq is "humbly embarrassed" about the technical glitch, and plans to redesign its IPO systems. He added that Nasdaq will ask the Securities and Exchange Commission to approve its plan to repay investors who were hurt by the computer error. 

But read a little further and you find this.

On Friday lead underwriter Morgan Stanley stepped in to keep the stock from falling below its $38 IPO price, and at the end of the day Facebook was up only 0.6 percent. Sources say the bank won't continue propping up the shares this week. There may also be more fallout from the Nasdaq glitch. Rick Meckler, president of investment firm LibertyView Capital Management told Reuters: "I don't know if people stepped away at some point because they just couldn't execute in a clear manner, and that Monday we will have some follow through of people that weren't executed and still need to sell."

More Mean Funnies

"Mitt Romney once lost $2 billion. Then he found it in another pair of pants."

-- David Letterman

"President Obama and Mitt Romney both gave commencement speeches over the last few days. Obama was like: 'You can be whatever you want to be.' Romney was like: 'I can be whatever you want me to be.'"

-- Jimmy Fallon

"I'm actually – I'm not familiar with precisely, exactly what I said. But I stand by what I said, whatever it was. And with regards to – I'll go back and take a look at what was said there."

Until next week, when I'll say whatever I think you want to hear and then I'll stand by that until I have to stand by something else I said.

-- Me

Jamie Dimon, still Master of the Universe

Perhaps he has added 'Master of the Putzes' to his many titles and professional distinctions. Then again, maybe it's the customers and shareholders of JPMorgan Chase that are the larger schmucks.

It’s official. Just as he was voted in for a second term as Class A New York Fed director in February 2010, Jamie Dimon was reelected chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase yesterday afternoon. He got to keep his $23 million pay package, too. All without breaking a sweat.

This means that at each of three of the top five bank-holding companies dominating U.S. derivatives exposure, loans, assets, and deposits, the same man holds the chairman and CEO positions—at Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, and JPM Chase.  (Bank of America and Citigroup separated those roles.). If the stock buckles under another “discovery,” shareholders can take comfort in blaming themselves, not Jamie Dimon.

[...]

At the shareholders meeting there was no mention of the details behind the “mistake” that cost the bank $2 billion, just that it “should never have happened.” (The Titanic shouldn’t have sunk either.) Most shareholders had already voted before the loss became public anyway. Ultimately, 91 percent of them approved Dimon’s pay, and 60 percent voted for him to retain both executive positions. This makes the timing of the loss announcement, if not suspicious, then, self-serving -- or self-inflicted.

If you haven't watched the HBO docu-drama Too Big to Fail, (based on the book by Andrew Sorkin), I heartily recommend doing so at your earliest opportunity. Here's the trailer:

Bill Pullman -- the President of the United States in Independence Day -- plays the far-more-MVP Dimon in this flick. It's both comical and pathetic to watch the once (Hank Paulson, played by William Hurt) and future (Tim Geithner, played by Billy Crudup) Secretaries of the Treasury kowtow, grovel, and prostrate themselves before Dimon.

One of the movie's best lines comes after Geithner (Crudup) describes a conversation with Dimon (Pullman): "I told him we need his help. And I asked him very politely not to [expletive] with us today."

Art imitates life imitating art. In real life, Geithner avoids any harsh language in suggesting, as politely as possible, that Dimon may want to reconsider his service on the same regulatory body that is responsible for policing his even-bigger-now-than-it-was-then TBTF bank.

No public response yet from the MotU. But I bet I can guess what the private one was: something along the lines of "STFU, MoFo".

The nicest thing that can be said about Jamie Dimon is that he may not be as evil as Mark Zuckerberg -- who got married yesterday following the failure of his company's IPO (not for him and a few others, but for everybody else). Congratulations, Mark and Priscilla. Y'all aren't moving to Singapore too, are ya?

Update: In quite possibly the worst conclusion ever leapt to in all of recorded history, Loren Steffy, business writer for the Houston Chronicle, argues that Chase's $2 billion dollar derivatives trading loss is why Elizabeth Warren should not be running for the US Senate.

Sunday 'We Mean Business' Funnies

Emphasis on 'mean' (adj).

Lissa Squiers for Congress

Personally speaking, this is the most important race in Harris County.

I have said this a time or two before, but it bears repeating as the early voting period gets started: there are three people running in the Democratic primary for Congressional District 7 for the right to square off against John "Doesn't Keep His Word" Culberson in November. One of the two men is an oil and gas attorney with Clinton administration connections, but whose campaign is managed and funded by Republicans and Republican interests (where have we heard of that elsewhere?). One of the more odious things this man's campaign has undertaken is to revisit local Democratic clubs and organizations to persuade them that their co-endorsement of his candidacy and one of his challengers should be revoted in his favor.

What's even worse is that he has occasionally succeeded in this venal tactic.

The other gentleman runs a global defense/security company (remember Blackwater? Like that). Until recently his website proclaimed in large letters at the top "Blue Dog Democrat".

The third person is Lissa Squiers, who has spent all of her time for the past several years engaging the community on the part of childhood education, womens' rights, gay rights, ... you name it. (Well, she names it all in her statement below.)

She has lived Democratic causes and fought Democratic battles while the two men made money and hired expensive consultants -- again, some of them Republican -- and decided to run for office.

Once again my friend Neil and I see eye-to-eye on this choice. Here is Lissa's appeal to the Democrats of CD-07, asking for your vote.

As a candidate for political office I meet a lot of people.  Every one of these people has the same basic needs, and underneath everything else, they are saying they want a good life for themselves and their children.   Every family benefits when people are healthy and educated.  Every community benefits when they have good roads and bridges and schools and first responders.  Every business benefits when people and families and communities are strong.  No one ever says they don’t want these things.

The next logical step is where we differ:  what’s good for people is what’s good for business.   That’s what I believe and that’s what liberal Democrats believe.  Centrists and ‘moderates’ in both parties believe the opposite.  They say that what’s good for business is what’s good for people.  Both of my opponents for Congressional District 7 have made a lifetime and a business out of this opposite approach.  But the economy and Occupy Wall Street and current reality for the majority of Americans shows us this doesn’t work – catering to corporations has given us nothing but a few scraps of their leftover lunch and a big mess to clean up.


I believe in equality:  Voting equality.  Women’s equality.  Wage equality.  Education equality.   Social equality.  Marriage equality.  Religious equality.   Racial equality.  Healthcare equality.  These things are our God-given, inalienable rights.   If I am honored with the opportunity to represent Congressional District 7 in Washington, my votes and acts and policies will come from these beliefs.   These things are good for people and good for communities.  Healthy people and healthy communities create and support healthy businesses and a healthy American economy.

My work in the community in education, juvenile justice, religious and voting rights, women’s rights and union rights are extensive and come from the heart.  As a Texan and Houstonian, my family’s history and future are here.  I hope you will vote in the upcoming Democratic primary to choose candidates that will support the equality and rights that are necessary to let Americans create the American Dream that we are all capable of.  I would be honored to receive your vote for Congressional District 7.  As a woman, as a mother, as a Texan, I know that 2012 is the year for the changes we need to take America forward.  And as a Democrat, I know that 2012 is the year that we make better lives for all, not just the privileged few.

So the choice is clear. And that holds true even if you're a Republican or a Blue Dog (not that there's a dime's worth of difference, mind you).