The Prince of Poyais

"I think that this is a financial crisis more extreme and more serious than that of the 1930s..." uttered Ed Balls, U.K. Cabinet Minister.  If you would like to read more, look here courtesy of the BBC.  The Prime Minister's office explained he was talking about the global financial economy, not the real one in the U.K.  Oh.

Well then.  Time for a resurgence of that amusing aptly-named genre, Rogue Literature, popular pamphlets published in Elizabethan times.  How does one keep from being conned or taken advantage of?  Small booklets on the seamy side of life provided amusement to all kinds of readers back in the days of old.  Many of them were written by the upper classes and provided the sensationalism of the day.  Samuel Rid, a man with no apparent biography wrote a pamphlet entitled "THE Art of Iugling or Legerdemaine" which detailed common con art tricks of the time.  

That was street crime.  But what about big schemes?  Gregor McGregor was the Bernard Madoff of his time, though far more romantic.  McGregor invented an island named Poyais and wrote an amazing book about it entitled "Sketch of the Mosquito Shore, including the territory of Poyais".  McGregor proclaimed that the islanders had declared him Prince of Poyais, and, were eager for settlers to join them.  He gathered investors, issued shares and minted his own fictitious island currency.  He sent ships of investors and settlers to the island.  This true story ends in a bad way as one might imagine.

There must be a good combination of the Gregor McGregor scheme and the world financial system rescue that could be hatched... 

"They spend too much time thinking"...

The video of Bernard Madoff at the Philoctetes Center is stunning...take a jaunt over to Tzvee's Talmudic Blog to view - scroll down to the Dec. 15th entry...there are some seriously funny moments...and, if you are pressed for time - the first 20 minutes are the best and the rest is worth skipping.  Lastly, try not to get too distracted by the man with the nervous trousers sitting in back of Mr. Madoff....

I'll be off the blog tomorrow - so this is tomorrow's offering posted today -

Uberwirtschaft

Missmarketcrash is terribly excited today because she is casting aside all worries (actually I am petrified) of Bernard L. Madoff's GIANT PONZI SCHEMES and the Car Thing to see Child number 1's school Christmas performance.  He is a German Tree.  Should be interesting.  I might add that we are in London.  Thankfully, the forward-looking state school is putting on a performance about the British and Germans casting aside differences on a Christmas Day during World War I to join together for a game of football.  And my son, the star, is a German Tree singing Stille Nacht.  How timely and appropriate after the bit in the news regarding the German finance minister and his statements.  After having a German au pair in the house once, I can only say that Germans are very direct and say what they think.  British people do not.  I can understand the Germans feeling a bit nihilistic about it all, and, thinking (aloud as they do) - "gosh that is silly - that will never work!"  Which is fair enough, but, diplomacy is more than in order these days and such things might be better off uttered in person, rather than to the press.  German brains also think differently - (if you look at the language structure or have read any German philosophy that seems to be self-evident).  Lots of subtle ways to combine words to shift meanings.  I imagine Peer Steinbruck goes to bed at night thinking and dreaming from an Uberwirtschaft perspective - a bit above it all looking down, yes, like one of those giant inflatable balloons tethered by strings floated down boulevards for parades.  Anyway, this Uberwirtschaft floats above it all and takes it all in from a god-like (but ungrounded in such things) perspective with a kind of neutral delight at the highs and lows of the mess and has forgotton that everyone else has immense sensitivity at the moment.  And I don't mean that in a bad way - if you are English you are now laughing at this vision of Uberwirtschaft for a completely different reason than if you are a German reader.  

In keeping with the nihilistic German theme, did you know "finanzkrise" was just voted word of the year on Germany?  I am guessing you do not need a translation.