The Great Plotnik

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Tell Me Again Who's Winning?



Like everyone else all across America, The Great Plotnik and The Great Ducknik stared at the screen last night and waved good bye and bon voyage to a bit of their life savings. Plot and Duck will be fine, as will most if not all of their friends, but there are many others, particularly those who tried the most recently to wedge themselves into the middle class, who will find themselves losing some of what they thought they had gained, or at least losing plenty of sleep over it.

It's like every pyramid scheme ever devised. If you get in and get out early, you make a bundle. If you're still holding up the building when it collapses, you get crushed.

Several years ago, people were buying real estate in the desert. "We can't lose!" they all said. They came to Plot and Duck. Plotnik said "if you want to live in the desert, buy houses in the desert. Don't invest in something you can't use, because when the bubble bursts you'll still own your houses in Alkali Flats or Seventy Seven Palms and you won't be able to sell them and the renters will trash them. You'll end up living out there. If that's what you want, do it."

Of course, this is the same Plotnik that told PD not to get publicity photos taken with Leonardo DiCaprio when they were kids, because Leonardo's career most likely would never go anywhere. Sometimes you get it right and sometimes you don't.

The Great Plotnik played a lot of poker when he was younger, and he was always a good poker player but never a great one. Gambling successfully demands that you understand the odds and play accordingly. You must bet when the odds require it, whether or not you have the money in your pocket. If you can't do it, you shouldn't play.

Plot couldn't. His pockets were never deep enough. He feared losing big, which made it impossible for him to win big. But at least he recognized it.

Nothing has changed. The fear of losing big makes the chance to win big less appetizing. Plot and Duck just don't like taking financial chances. When you've got Wall Street and the Pentagon running your country, it's not an unreasonable attitude to have.

He wishes the government felt the same way. He would have given them the same answer about the biggest dice game of them all: Iraq. "Unless you want to own a country in the desert, don't invest in it. You're not going to be able to sell it and the renters will trash the place."

The longer we stay, the more it costs us, to the tune of billions of dollars a day. Meanwhile, our financial markets are in collapse. And now listen to this: John McCain has the balls to say we're winning.

Talk about lipstick on a pig.

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