Just Throw It In The Bank

I'll admit that in typical honky fashion I misunderstood the words to this song the first time I heard it on the radio. Instead of saying "bag" I initially thought he was saying "bank", which made sense to me since he starts by saying "I got that black amex aka that throw it in the bag (or bank) card". Although I now know the real lyrics I still enjoy listening to the song while assuming he is instead saying "bank" and talking about shamelessly acquiring copious amounts of credit card debt (give it a try). In this assumption of mine, Fabulous understands that he has no choice but to maintain a certain standard of living in the present regardless of what that equates to in the future. It doesn't matter that he is making disastrous long run decisions because HAS TO remain fly in the present.

Like most Americans, this song always makes me think about bank bailouts and where all those toxic assets really went. Everyone would agree that the recession we are theoretically coming out of has been an uncomfortable burden to bare but shouldn't it have been a lot worse? We aren't just talking about the dot-com bubble bursting or a housing market slump but the collapse of our entire banking system. As aggravated as all the populist rhetoric about bank bailouts is, they are what has allowed us to maintain this relatively stable, comfortable standard of living. Although we averted disaster via the government buying up bank's toxic assets that doesn't mean the problem just went away. It's not like there was some massive surplus in a glass case labeled "IN CASE OF RECESSION BREAK GLASS". So where did those toxic assets go? They got added on to the already enormous US debt, debt that we as a country have to pay interest on. Instead of dealing with the real recession we were supposed to face we have essentially thrown it on a credit card (call it China Express) to maintain the standard of living that has become ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to America. Saying some banks are too big to fail is like saying Fabulous is too famous to be broke. I personally do not know enough to argue whether or not we should have bailed out the banks. However, I can say that I'm happy to be blogging on my laptop at college instead of standing on a bread line on Long Island.



Although those were all assumptions that I was making about Fabulous I can't help but suspect he needed to make some extra money on the side. Case and point, when I googled his name to find a picture for this post I discovered he was recently arrested for having 500lbs of marijuana on his tour bus en route from the NBA All Star Game in Phoenix to Boston where he claims to have been going to "pick up someone who's name he could not remember". I told myself I wasn't going to make a bailout joke here and I'm sticking to that.