A Roster of Wall Street's Finest...

As billions of taxpayer dollars are about to be showered on the banking industry, here's a list of felonious con artists who should probably be going to jail this summer, but will instead be renting/buying or renovating Hamptons mansions and laughing at us hapless working stiffs as their private jets careen to and from NYC! Remember them when you lose your job, health care coverage and retirement savings in the years ahead.

John Thain -- Hyper douche bag who spent $1.2 million to redesign his corner office. (Ever shit on a $35,000 toilet...It feels great!) Distributed more than a billion dollars in bonuses to Merrill's incompetent senior executives before the Bank of America buyout. Finally flushed out of the toilet that is Wall Street.

Ken Lewis -- This bloated windbag of a CEO found out Merrill lost $15 billion after his Bank of America bought the once illustrious Wall Street firm at government urging. He may be walking the plank soon.

Bernie Madoff -- This heartless scheming, scumbag of the highest order ran a $50 global billion Ponzi scheme with co-conspirator Ezra Merkin, a crook who steered billions of dollars into Bernie's (and his) pockets.

Jimmy Cayne -- Smoked dope, played bridge and spend most of his time on the golf course while his over-leveraged investment bank Bear Stearns collapsed.

Angelo Mozillo -- This son of a butcher man sold fraudulent sub-prime loans as chief hack of Countrywide Financial and paid himself $470 million between 2001 and 2006 just before the recent financial market meltdown. Angelo took his meat stick to all of his employees before dancing off into the sunset.

Dick Fuld -- Dick dickered as he screwed thousands, all the while amassing a personal fortune close to a billion prior to the collapse. His Lehman Brothers went limping into Chapter 11 while Dick made love to himself on his personal Squash court in Greenwich, CT.

Sandy Weill -- This egotistical former Brooklyn shoe salesman created Citigroup, not too long ago the world's largest bank. Now that failing Deathstar has borrowed $45 billion from the federal government (you, sucker!) and will probably be broken up. You can still see the Weill name plastered proudly at Carnegie Hall. Sandy's legendary greed and ruthlessness has been music to his own ears for years.

Bob Rubin -- Former wunderkind who accepts no responsibility for the Citigroup disaster. The ultimate spineless establishment insider who will no doubt be rewarded for his Citigroup "success" by receiving a plum government job cleaning up the shit pile he created. Bob is a nice guy who finished first on the backs of everyone else.

Ponzi Street...

From the SEC website:

"Ponzi schemes are a type of illegal pyramid scheme named for Charles Ponzi, who duped thousands of New England residents into investing in a postage stamp speculation scheme back in the 1920s ... Ponzi was deluged with funds from investors, taking in $1 million during one three-hour period—and this was 1921! Though a few early investors were paid off to make the scheme look legitimate, an investigation found that Ponzi had only purchased about $30 worth of the international mail coupons."

Essentially, the U.S. financial services industry was (and is) one giant ponzi scheme and an illegal pyramid scheme. Wall Street takes investor's money by promising a huge return on their investment based on their "expertise" and only after charging excessive fees. Their promises in turn lure more investors, and the banks then pay them with money robbed from the first investors, and so on with subsequent investors.

But to those investors who gave Wall Street their hard-earned money and have seen it disappear recently like Sagaponack resident Ira Rennert; the question of the day is: Where did it all go?

Grossly inflated executive salaries...special influence peddling that buys off the government's regulators...creation of a shadow, unregulated financial system led by hedge funds for the rich...new financial products, or derivatives, based on guano...financing of media consolidation that prevents fair and accurate reporting of the Ponzi scheme...privatization...globalization...environmental degradation...moral and ethical bankruptcy...Everything goes well until the scam is exposed!

In 2008, Wall Street's Ponzi scam was revealed...The emperor has no clothes. All the high-priced, overpaid legal, accounting and corporate talent from the finest schools were Ponzi perpetrators who deserve jail time, but will instead receive plum government jobs "reforming" the system as the new regulators...They're counting on you forgetting the lessons of history...They want you to invest in the next new Wall Street Ponzi scheme ahead. Our advice: DON"T BELIEVE THESE CROOKS FOR A SECOND!

BARACK OBAMA OFFERED CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN...DON'T BELIEVE THAT CROOK FOR A SECOND EITHER!

LIKE BUSH, HE'S A FEEL-GOOD FIGUREHEAD...When Wall Street's Ponzi scheme was exposed, they got our tax dollars while you lost your job, dignity and home (not necessarily in that order.) Get real America, the only real change we can believe in is that the Ponzi scheme will go on.