Anarchists warn. "This is just the start"

bluey890

Cleaver wrote: »

<sigh>
And whilst we're here, I don't see much difference between Fred Goodwin and anyone else.

its very sad that u carry such a low opinion of people

not everyone is selfish & greedy. u need better friends

yorksrabbit

Cleaver wrote: »

<sigh>

And whilst we're here, I don't see much difference between Fred Goodwin and anyone else. . . .

Sorry Cleaver, but. . .

Goodwin occupied that small, closed world where everyone is so anxious to protect each other's backs and further each other's venality that board rooms have progressively come to have less to do with the running of a company as lining the pockets of members of The Directors' Mutual Aid Society.

Most "anyone else's" aren't in that Mutual Aid Society.

And they certainly were not on the board of Royal Bank of Scotland, where Goodwin's obscene compensation for failure was voted through by people looking to no other interests except their own: after all, should Goodwin ever turn up in a key position somewhere else, then those who approved his pension pay-out have a pretty good chance of picking up the phone one day to receive a call from him, offering a sweet little non-executive directorship at, say, £50,000 a year for one day a month's "work."

That's how it goes.

Of course I agree with you in the sense that all human enterprise is fallible, but please don't think for a moment that those at the top of the pre-crash banking world didn't know how essential the banking sector is to the national economy.

Of course they knew.

And knowing that, they also knew that just as a bank could not be allowed to fail, then neither would they ever be called upon to pay the price for failure, but would instead be allowed to head off into the sunset with an annual pension greater than "anyone else" earns in a lifetime (Goodwin) or a neat little collection of Ferraris and Lamborghinis stabled at a country mansion (Adam Applegarth, Northern Rock) or a £60,000-a-month (!) "consultancy fee" which Andy Hornby, HSBOS CEO, confirmed to the Select Committee is the sum he presently earns from another financial outfit for the benefit of his undoubted, er, experience and expertise.

(To which list can also be added the utterly inept McKillop, RBS chairman, Chief Goodwin Cheerleader, and co-presiding genius of the AMRO takeover who despite a track record so disastrous he shouldn't be in charge of a fruit barrow has just -- guess what -- had his name put forward for another highly lucrative term on the Board of Directors of BP. . .)

Failure? Wot failure?

The Directors' Mutual Aid Society and, especially, The Bankers Mutual Back Scratching Preservation Society, was and so seems still to be, a cosy club of cronies united in a shared contempt for the "anyone else" you mention in your post -- a club as devoid of morals as, it's now evident, it was devoid of talent or skill.

In answer to your post then, sorry to disagree but. . .

There is a difference.

JP45

yorksrabbit wrote: »

Goodwin occupied that small, closed world where everyone is so anxious to protect each other's backs and further each other's venality that board rooms have progressively come to have less to do with the running of a company as lining the pockets of members of The Directors' Mutual Aid Society.

Absolutley spot on. And here's some further evidence of the sort of behaviour that you and I, and I would hope most people, find so reprehensible. It's an extract from a book review by David Smith that appeared in last weekend's Sunday Times:

Much of the commentary about the financial crisis has been about how the people who ran the banks had no idea of the risks they were running. In the case of Bear Stearns, the incompetence was even more basic. While the bank was in convulsions last March, its chief executive, Alan Schwartz, was in Palm Beach attending the firm's four-day media conference and playing golf. Its chairman, Jimmy Cayne, was in Detroit, taking part in a bridge competition. At one point, when his decision was needed on whether to put Bear Stearns into bankruptcy, it transpired that he had left the conference call and had to be hauled back from the bridge table by his wife.

Cayne is the presence that dominates this book. He had joined the bank in 1969, at the age of 35, and rose to the top through a combination of guile and chutzpah. Like !!!!!! Fuld of Lehman Brothers, he ruled the publicly quoted company as his own fiefdom.

Cleaver

yorksrabbit wrote: »

Sorry Cleaver, but. . .

Goodwin occupied that small, closed world where everyone is so anxious to protect each other's backs and further each other's venality that board rooms have progressively come to have less to do with the running of a company as lining the pockets of members of The Directors' Mutual Aid Society.

Most "anyone else's" aren't in that Mutual Aid Society.

And they certainly were not on the board of Royal Bank of Scotland, where Goodwin's obscene compensation for failure was voted through by people looking to no other interests except their own: after all, should Goodwin ever turn up in a key position somewhere else, then those who approved his pension pay-out have a pretty good chance of picking up the phone one day to receive a call from him, offering a sweet little non-executive directorship at, say, £50,000 a year for one day a month's "work."

That's how it goes.

Of course I agree with you in the sense that all human enterprise is fallible, but please don't think for a moment that those at the top of the pre-crash banking world didn't know how essential the banking sector is to the national economy.

Of course they knew.

And knowing that, they also knew that just as a bank could not be allowed to fail, then neither would they ever be called upon to pay the price for failure, but would instead be allowed to head off into the sunset with an annual pension greater than "anyone else" earns in a lifetime (Goodwin) or a neat little collection of Ferraris and Lamborghinis stabled at a country mansion (Adam Applegarth, Northern Rock) or a £60,000-a-month (!) "consultancy fee" which Andy Hornby, HSBOS CEO, confirmed to the Select Committee is the sum he presently earns from another financial outfit for the benefit of his undoubted, er, experience and expertise.

(To which list can also be added the utterly inept McKillop, RBS chairman, Chief Goodwin Cheerleader, and co-presiding genius of the AMRO takeover who despite a track record so disastrous he shouldn't be in charge of a fruit barrow has just -- guess what -- had his name put forward for another highly lucrative term on the Board of Directors of BP. . .)

Failure? Wot failure?

The Directors' Mutual Aid Society and, especially, The Bankers Mutual Back Scratching Preservation Society, was and so seems still to be, a cosy club of cronies united in a shared contempt for the "anyone else" you mention in your post -- a club as devoid of morals as, it's now evident, it was devoid of talent or skill.

In answer to your post then, sorry to disagree but. . .

There is a difference.

That's a cracking post and leaves me failing to find a defense.

I suppose what I'm trying to say is that he's become a symbol for the situation we find ourselves in. A symbol used by the public, the media and the government. I can't disagree with any of your post regading any of the chiefs you mention, but isn't it the overall, huge systemic situation we find ourselves to blame, rather than one man, or a handful of men? Until the system is changed, it's human nature to try and push any system to the limit, to take as many risks as possible, to try and make as much money as possible. You'll get Goodwins until the cows come home I guess.

I guess I'm saying that I find it difficult to find comtempt for the man. If it wasn't him doing that role, it would have been the next person. Or the person after them. The system needs changing to prevent this happening, it's not about individuals.

ninky_2

Cleaver wrote: »

The system needs changing to prevent this happening, it's not about individuals.

you are absolutely right cleaver. but us humans do so like to view history as the actions of individual agents, and not the collective forces that are oh so much more powerful. so ww2 is all about hitler and churchill. american foreign policy was all about bush. and now the credit crunch is the fault of brown.

of course, we love an icon. and fred the shred is such a compelling one (all those details about changing the expensive carpets at RBS HQ twice, and disciplining his staff over "rogue biscuits" in the board room). in fact, he is as much a symbol for our collective desire for change as he is of greed and corruption. and i think, perhaps, it's right to harness the power of that.

lostinrates

bluey890 wrote: »

lostinrates wouldn't try to hide income.

I don't understand what this is about or how I manage, fail to manage or mismanage my affairs has to do with this?

FWIW no I wouldn't hide income. We make some use of basic management for tax, e.g. I hold our savings, not DH because of income threshhold. Personally I'd rather see a shared system bewteen married/civil partnership couples, where threshholds are looked at across the household. It wouldn't benefit us so well, in the long term, but it seems a better system to me, for the majority of couples. The savings are mainly mine, but when we became married they became ours.

Degenerate

Cleaver wrote: »

I guess I'm saying that I find it difficult to find comtempt for the man. If it wasn't him doing that role, it would have been the next person. Or the person after them. The system needs changing to prevent this happening, it's not about individuals.

Just because the policing could have been better, does not mean we should forgive the criminals.

(And I'm talking metaphorically, before someone jumps in and says Fred hasn't been found to have commited any crime (yet).)

bluey890

lostinrates wrote: »

I don't understand what this is about or how I manage, fail to manage or mismanage my affairs has to do with this?

if u reread the post, u will realize it was a counter statement to greed and selfishness.

eta: have now changed the counter example (was asked for a forum member) to the somewhat unsung wtc hero: zhe zeng.

lostinrates

bluey890 wrote: »

if u reread the post, u will realize it was a counter statement to greed and selfishness.

eta: have now changed the counter example (was asked for a forum member) to the somewhat unsung wtc hero: zhe zeng.

Thank you.

I just don't like being brought in to any in-fighting, and I saw my name and bit:o. I'm ruddy glad I've been too bust to be around here over the weekend. I do not like the forum when its 'like this', i was wrong to bite, and I did wrongly interpret, my apologies As it happens, you're right. But its easy to say it online, in reality know one here would know if I'm sitting on a huge undeclared income. :o

bluey890

things get taken the wrong way on forums - written communication is small percentage of the total. what men class as healthy discussion women class as fighting. men often get things out in the open and settled far quicker than women - who are frequently more cunning in there approach.

an interesting weekend. too many sockies on here for me - im not one btw.

thanks for the apology, have a good birthday.

i will call it quits now.