My Day At Occupy Wall Street

Since I am still unemployed (got a job and start in a week or so thank you very little) I figured I would check out the whole "Occupy Wall Street" thing going on downtown.  A bit of irony, the square they are squatting in is directly across from where I used to work.  Oh the irony.  But I digress.  Today was all about getting to the bottom of the question, "What is Occupy Wall Street All About?"  I am hoping that the UN-edited question and answer video taken by The Angry Trader today will shed some light into who are these people and what do they want??

There is one thing painfully clear to us here at The Angry Trader.  This is not about (or all about) Wall Street for most people.  Just like I wrote yesterday...it is about whatever is pissing people off in their lives.  Take a look at the videos.  Listen(sorry for the background noise) to what the people have to say.  I think the movement should be renamed to, "The American Dream is Gone" or "Government Fail."  Here are a few of my interviews. 



A quick discussion of class warfare...


And another.....this guy is out there...


Here were the two nice Jewish Girls promoting the holiday of Sukkot:


And here are some other real freaks...




To this guy, Occupy Wall Street is a battle with the food companies....


I did find one business owner and this is what her husband(?) and she had to say:



The bottom line is the people I spoke with care about Wall Street, but clearly it is not their primary focus.  change the name of Occupy Wall Street to Government Fail and all will be well.

--The Angry Trader

Can We Just NUKE IRAN NOW??

If we do not NUKE IRAN NOW, they will attack us.  Be warned.

It has long been the position of The Angry Trader that there is no stopping IRAN but to NUKE them back into the stone age.  So now we find out a plot that the Iranians launched to kill the Saudi Ambassador and attack their and Israel's embassies in DC.  Does it surprise you?  It shouldn't. 

Someone has nuclear terror on his brain...

In the past 8 weeks, The Angry Trader just wrote of a quiet war underway in Persia.  One involving IRAN vs. SAUDI ARABIA.  The Arab Spring is all about this war.  It is all about regime change under the guise of democracy.  Only after the regime is overthrown, Iranian backed leaders are taking over the countries....

This is in attempt to isolate Saudi Arabia, and ultimately overthrow their government. 

This type of terror attack WILL happen in America. 


IRAN IS AT WAR WITH AMERICA...when will you all pull your collective heads out of your asses and wake up?  Probably after they attack us.

--The Angry Trader.

Why Occupy Wall Street is Full of Shit

I want to get a few things off my chest.  First and foremost, where the fuck were these retards in 2008, 2009 and 2010?  They allegedly protest the bank bailouts...but that's not all they protest.  They basically protest EVERYTHING they don't like with either this country or the world.  Don't roll your eyes at me.  Don't be saying to yourself, there he goes again...the conservative...

Because that would be intellectually dishonest and complete bullshit:  Why?

1.  In 2007 The Angry Trader warned you and the world of the impending financial crisis. 

2.  From 2007 to the present, the Angry Trader has argued with great specificity over and over again that our political system AND financial systems were broken.

3.  Beginning in 2007 The Angry Trader WARNED you that civil unrest and ultimately anarchy would sweep this country.

4.  The Angry Trader continues to warn that things are NOT OK, and that a global financial collapse still looms ahead.

So why do I think Occupy Wall Street is full of shit?  Simple.  This gathering is not about Wall Street.  They think it is.  In reality it is a vote against government and a broad protest of institutions.  What institutions?  What elements of the government?

1.  ALL Government
2.  Financial
3.  Educational
4.  Employment
5.  Medical

Take a look at these images from buzzfeed.com;  they went out of their way to highlight who the 99% is.  http://www.buzzfeed.com/jpmoore/reasons-people-are-occupying-wall-street. 

Each image is more saddening than the next(except for picture #12--and we will discuss him in more depth in a moment).  The images and the issues addressed are not about Wall Street.  Wall Street is the scape goat here.  The issues are all related to the institutions listed above.  These institutions are all broken.  And this is the root of our problem in America as well as the problem on a global scale. 

Nowhere in the Constitution does it articulate that as an American you are entitled to shit beyond; life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  The Constitution does not articulate a set of rules (or even guidelines) that would offer entitlements such as, free health insurance, free higher education, employment, or any type of welfare. 

We have created a Welfare system that has helped bankrupt our country.  We have created the presumption that the Government will fix things and take care of us and at the same time we have created the notion that we are all entitled to something. 

This is NOT about Wall Street and it is clearly about a frustration with a broad institutional breakdown.  Until the Occupy Wall Street people figure this out, they will not be taken seriously and they will continue to really piss me the fuck off.
Check out this video...it highlights how this is NOT ABOUT WALL STREET!! 

Lastly, lets go back to person or image number 12.  That guy embodies America.  That to me is the American dream.  Have an idea?  Do it!  Work your ass off and make it happen.  Grow it!!  Succeed.....   That guy said, 'I am mad as hell and I am not going to take it anymore!"  He didn't go down to the square in Manhattan and squat.  He fucking did something about it.

When did the government helping you out get in the middle of a formula that has worked for the past 200+ years?

I can hear you libs yelling now...there are no jobs..there is no help...there is no money to pay for mortgages, food etc...  I hear ya.  That is NOT Wall Street's fault.  It's just not.  Wall Street is a piece to a much larger problem we are dealing with. 

So SUCK IT!! Ocuupy Wall Street.  Suck it!

--The Angry Trader.

Herman Cain: 9-9-9 Understand it...

Here is Herman Cain explaining his 9-9-9 tax plan.  I like it...


--This guy is for real.  We need a savvy business leader to fix this mess.  As of now, no candidate, aside from Herman Cain, has put forth ANY plan to solve a single problem.

--The Angry Trader.

Sharing Some Fear (and insight) With You

I don't have a lot to say today, aside from Margaret Cho being a fucking retard (see her article in the Huffington Post on why she considers herself queer), so I wanted to share my "chart of truth".  Those of you who have known or worked with me over the years, know that I created a special chart that has been dead on.  In 2008  it allowed me to call for the S&P to go to 624.  It went to 666 if you recall, so there is some historical relevance to the chart and the call.

I want to highlight that if the markets close down today, the S&P is headed to 1000.  Then much lower.  Understand this, we need to take out that 666 low.  It was a false bottom put in place by Governments attempting to fuck with survival of the fittest.  You simply cannot do that.  So here is the chart.  Fire away with any questions you have either here or email The Angry Trader directly: 

Feel free to click on the image to get a better look at how shitty the Chart of Truth looks.  Get your flack jacket, your battle helmet, your guns and gold and some antacid.  You're gonna need them....

--The Angry Trader.

Soros Predicting a Dire Fall and the Significant Potential for a Global Financial Collapse

I am no fan of this guy for a lot of reasons.  However, he has been around since dinosaurs turned into oil which means that he has seen many cycles.  Below is a  summary of his comments last week and if you click on the top title, it will take you to the clip of his interview late last week with CNBC

What is scary is since that interview which happened on Thursday of last week, Soros became more concerned saying essentially what we published yesterday.  The EU's inability to act quickly will drag the world into a situation worse than what we experienced with Lehman. 

Like I said yesterday, this is scary scary shit.  I sold half my gold position today, fyi.  Lock in some gains and look to buy it back cheaper.

--The  Angry Trader.

Doomed to Fail



Yep, I am talking about the EU.  It is now just a matter of time before the second most recent attempt at socialism fails.  (The most recent is still underway led by Obama). 

 

We know that history repeats itself.  Can we have a modern day crisis in Europe

without another World War?

In the past several hours, wsj.com  has posted an article highlighting how, "critical differences between European leaders threatened to stymie efforts to combat the euro zone's debt woes, despite mounting international pressure to contain a broadening crisis."  You know what this means?  It means there is a  reason we had 2 World Wars in less than 50 years fought in Europe proper. 

You see, the Angry Trader is generally mad, but he recognizes that people suck.  It also means that these fucks are going to sit by on their asses and principles, coupled with the belief that they are standing up for what their constituents want, even though the EU is going to zero and it's going to take the global economy with it.  In America, we have a phrase for that, its called biting off your nose to spite your face.  

The heart of the problem is that..."after a weekend of tense meetings among world finance officials here, euro-zone leaders were weighing options to maximize the size of their bailout fund by borrowing against it." 



Fuck Austerity, they chant....



BORROWING AGAINST IT.  AGAINST THEIR LOAN.  THEY WANT TO BORROW AGAINST THEIR LOAN, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.  THEY WANT TO ADD MORE DEBT IN A BAILOUT WHERE EVERYONE WHO HAS A CLUE UNDERSTANDS THE SPENDING HAS TO STOP!!!

Some of the European officials, a.k.a "retards" in Europe, " hinted at their options to respond with new force. Leveraging the bailout fund by borrowing against it could enable it to cover investors' first losses. That money could be used to buy debt on the market or inject capital into banks."

BORROWING AGAINST IT. AGAINST THEIR LOAN. THEY WANT TO BORROW AGAINST THEIR LOAN, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA. THEY WANT TO ADD MORE DEBT IN A BAILOUT WHERE EVERYONE WHO HAS A CLUE UNDERSTANDS THE SPENDING HAS TO STOP!!!

The Journal also states, "officials are also discussing how to use the European Central Bank's balance sheet—with trillions of dollars of lending capacity—to protect the euro zone further by buying more debt or backing debt. Some of the options could be used to help prevent a Greek default, or even attempt to insulate the rest of the euro zone from a Greek default by pushing capital into European banks and building a firewall around larger vulnerable euro-zone nations like Spain and Italy."

This would be worth exploring except for the fact that default is already in the cards for Spain and Italy.  Just like we here in the good 'ol USA waited too long to take draconian measures to stem a complete and utter global financial failure, the EU and then ultimately the individual sovereign nations will continue to dicker amongst themselves until it is too late.   In America we also call this, robbing Peter to pay Paul...


The good news is that all 17 nations of the EU need to approve the agreement, where they would seek to broaden the bailout fund and let trillions of dollars provide a boost to rescue governments and banks.  The problem again is we cannot be levering bailouts. 





"We're Fucked"

 

Most notably, Germany is not too keen on the idea.  They know 1. It's a really really BAD idea and 2. If the shit hits the fan, they are on the hook for essentially all of it.  Again, when The Angry Trader is defending anything German, there is a fucking problem...and we are defending Germany. 

Moreover, "policy makers are "focused on their own internal restraints, so that we don't have the outcome that we need," Antonio Borges, head of the International Monetary Fund's Europe department, said Sunday. While key players were understandably acting in self-interest, he said, it was generating "disastrous" collective results."

Did you get that?  Disastrous collective results.  Scary fucking shit and it's coming to a nation across the pond very very soon. 

So each nation is going to do what they need to do for themselves and essentially fuck the EU.  They will default and the process will begin.  The EU is doomed.  It always was and it will be very interesting to see it unravel.

Stay tuned and sell the rallies.

--The Angry Trader.



Hats Off To New York State Department of Labor!!

If you recall I began the unemployment insurance process last week.  I want to admit I was DEAD WRONG in what I expected vs. the wonderful reality that is filing unemployment with the state of New York.  I guess they have had so many applicants, they have had the time to really work the kinks out.  Couple that with the almost complete removal of the human interface from the process and it is pretty streamlined and efficient.

It is easy peasy people.  You go online to http://www.labor.ny.gov/ and fill out a form.  If you are from out of state like I am, you make a call that takes 10 minutes and then you go online.  EASSSSY!!

So now I sit at home waiting for my $405.00 a week from Uncle Sam.  I gotta start to do the math in terms of what I paid in over the last 10 years vs. what I can take out.  It says I am only permitted (I almost said entitled) just over $10,000 in total insurance...hmmmmm....seems like a great deal for the government but again, I will do some quick math.  It just so happens I have my W2's handy for the past few years. 

So thank you State of New York.  For all of the complaining I do about government it is so refreshing to find a segment that works!!

--The Angry Trader

Which CEO is worse? I say they both suck!!

I have hated Hewlett Packard (HPQ) forever.  I once had a hp computer and it sucked.  The only thing to buy with a HP label on it is a printer.  That's it.  If you are reading this post on a HPQ machine...sorry! 



"I just made $35million in 9 months for being a
CEO of a shit hole company.  What a year!
Who is next in line for me to destroy
the inherent value of your company in
a year or less?"



Internally the company has sucked for over 10 years.  One CEO sucking worse than the next, but what has happened at HPQ in the past year is nothing short of fucking stunning:

In the last year they sacked their old CEO and appointed the former head of SAP as their new chief.  Understand that Leo had systematically missed multiple cycle changes, his software and platform was old and dated and the only thing keeping the stock up was the legal need for Germans to own German stocks.  So after fucking SAP royally, he made 2 decisions in the last month that shocked the investment community and the world.

1.  Even though the product launch was only weeks old, HPQ was exiting the tablet market (ipad competitor).  Then they decided they would keep selling them at a price point where HPQ was losing money on each sale.  Good call. 



"Yes I suck at being a CEO.  But HPQ sucks worse, and I look
forward to putting the final nails in their coffin."

2.  They announced they were getting out of the computer market.  WHAT????  Once those words were uttered, the entire world called Michael Dell and said..."sign us up and ship us asap". 

Then, late this week rumors started to surface about Leo being replaced by an even worse CEO, Meg Whitman.  Meg basically ruined EBAY by making it just a ho-hum company.  She was never able to really extract a better value for the underlying business and the company still has done nothing with their hidden gem, Pay-Pal.

Today it was announced that Meg was the new CEO of HPQ.  I am putting the odds of her being at HPQ 2 years from now at less than 5%.  The only question I have is in 2 years will HPQ still be HPQ or will be be folded into another better run company.

The only worse choice would have been Sue Decker to run the ship.  Good luck Meg, good luck HP, you are surely going to need it!

--The Angry Trader.



A Simpleton Explains Why Obama's "Fair Share" Argument Holds No Water

Ha Ha, I am sure you all thought, here goes The Angry Trader explaining things.  NOPE.  It's the retard Bill O'Reilly who from time to time uses truth, statistics and logic to make a compelling argument.  Whether you agree with him or not, whether you agree with raising taxes to 99% of gross income, you have to agree that somewhere in this message of raising taxes for a jobs bill and people doing their fair share, the truth is getting lost....



That's all I have for you sports fans...

--The Angry Trader.

More Fuzzy Math and the Same Bullshit

So after waiting and waiting and waiting some more, we get Obama's answer to how he is going to fund his new jobs bill.  Taxes, Taxes and Taxes.  The size and scope of the spending cuts...even over 10 years are pathetic and will do NOTHING to change the underlying fundamentals of our debt crisis and floundering economy.

First, the jobs bill is just another example of tax and spend.  Think I am wrong?  Think the president is really going to do something different this time?  Here are the details as laid out by the Miami Herald (GO CANES!!)>

NOTHING is new, NOTHING is different.  I guess that makes it right:

"Among his tax proposals:

• Letting the Bush tax cuts expire as scheduled on Dec. 31, 2012 for individual incomes above $200,000 and family incomes above $250,000. The total over 10 years: $800 billion;
• Limiting itemized deductions for the same incomes. Total over 10 years: $400 billion;
• Closing loopholes for oil and gas companies. Total: $40 billion;
• Raising taxes on investment fund managers. Total: $18 billion;
• Raising taxes on owners of corporate jets. Total: $3 billion.

The one line of spending cuts out of the whopping $3 Trillion in savings? 

• $580 billion will come from cuts to mandatory spending, including in Medicare and Medicaid."

"Obama also will propose principles for tax reform — including one he'll call the "Buffett rule" after friend Warren Buffett, the billionaire investor.  Buffet has lamented that he pays lower overall taxes than his secretary because he makes most of his income off of the sale of stocks, and capital gains on stocks are taxed at a lower rate than even middle incomes.  With that in mind, Obama will urge that any tax reform make sure millionaires pay the same overall tax rate as the middle class."

 A few quick observations:

As of sometime earlier in the day our national debt was $14,712,175,755,103.91 That's TRILLION.   Our president is talking about $3.1Trillion in savings but only $1.5 are from spending cuts.  The remainder are from the above noted tax increases!  The math again does not add up!  I don't care about paying higher taxes now.  Things are so bad, that I get it...I need to.  But...spending more is NOT the answer and proposals like what we have seen out of the White House are not going to fix/solve a thing!



"Man I thought picking off my
house in 2009 was a good buy! 
Now it looks like it's a goodbye
house, goodbye car, goodbye
boat...."



2.  Housing is what took us into this global abyss and it is what will take us out of it.  By cutting itemized deductions, you are hurting home owners.  Interest payments on a mortgage are generally the largest single deduction a home owner takes.  That is now going away.  Moreover in my most recent housing checks, things continue to deteriorate!!  Short sales in affluent neighborhoods around the country are mounting.  This brings every one's property value down, making your net worth less and less (if at all) in your home.  It makes you poorer(sorry for the poor English).  It weighs on you and keeps you on your wallet.



Like this poor lady, our economy is out of gas and too
tired to get herself up....



3.  Letting the Bush tax cuts expire post the next presidential election will save an estimated $800Billion over 10 years.  Did I mention that the national deficit is north of $14 TRILLION??  How the fuck can $800 Billion over 10 years matter?  Moreover, these "tax breaks" are monies that get spent rather than go to government coffers!  That is money business owners can spend on their company, their employees or on their families.   I put forth to all of you that this money would be better off being put back into the economy via the natural order of capitalism. 

4.   So out of a $3+ Trillion savings package only $580B will come from cuts.  The rest will come from tax increases.  I get that we need to pay more but again....this math does NOT work.  This math is CLASS WARFARE, and it is clear to this author, yet again, that our country is being run by a man who desires to see socialism alive and well in America.

5.  Don't get me started on Warren Buffett.  Prick.

I don't hate Obama.  I don't.  I just wish they had a bit more of a clue in the White House these days....

--The Angry Trader.

Hurry up and Wait!!



"This is a recording.  You can only apply for unemployment benefits
when it is convenient for the state.

 Job Interview? 
Fuck You.
Dr. appointment?
Fuck you.
Family problem?
Fuck you."



Today, sports fans, is one of those days where nothing is really going right and I am freaking the fuck out its been 4 weeks since the division of my company was shut down.  Throw on top of that an interview that went horribly wrong and today is well a huge pile of shit.

So I came home and figured, what the fuck.  I will make the unemployment insurance call.  I might as well get my $400 a week, as I have been paying into the system for a mighty long time.  Get this:  There are so many claims, and so many people calling in, they break new claim filing down by letters in the alphabet.  Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday they break things down and anyone call call the rest of the week if you missed your day to call. 

Suffice to day, today is not the correct day to call.  Fuck!!  I will be back to you in a few days as the week progresses.  Quite an auspicious start I must say...

--The Angry Trader.

Have A Great Vacation...Oh, By The Way.....You're Fired!



Stay tuned.  The process should be pretty funny and somewhat
good for the monthly free cash flow...



That is basically how the third Monday of August went for me.  Fucking A.  Down the shore, chillin on the beach with the kids and I get an email telling me to dial into the home office at 4:15 for a conf. call.  Fuck.  That cannot be good, I thought to myself.  So bla bla bla, all you need to know is that every morning for the last 5 years I have had to ask the people on our morning business call to be on mute and every mother fucking day I had to interrupt and ask at least one person to hit their fucking mute button because they were broadcasting over something much more important.  Why is this important?  Because I dialed in early, and started breathing really really heavy into the phone before the CEO got on.  I kept breathing heavy off and on during the conference call.  It was painfully funny and hard not to laugh.  Sometimes I kill myself. 



Please allow me to escort you
through the process of getting Obama money!!



I cannot really say anything bad against my former employer for a variety of legal reasons, but I can tell you that having 3 CEO's in 3 years is never a good thing.  Especially when the last one wants to get out of your business.  Rather than rant and sling mud, I am going to take you all through the process of filing for unemployment.  I figure this should be a real fucking eye-opener with a lot of opportunity for content here.  Stay tuned bitches, I'm gettin my Obama money! 

--The Angry Trader.

Karaoke Asshole 1, Nice Guys 0

They say that "nice guys finish last". For the longest time, I believed this was a lie perpetuated by assholes who could only bag drunk skanks. It's not. It's 100% true. The day I began applying "Costanza's Law" to my interactions with females and said the OPPOSITE of what my mother and father raised me to say, I started collecting a lot more phone numbers. I don't look at this as some Faustian compromise of my principles. I never had any principles in the first place. I was just a delusional moron who thought chivalry (a nice-guy euphemism for "pathetic ass kissing") would get me laid. Ladies, if you find this troubling, offensive, or something else that's predictably vapid, tough noogies. Your gender's collective affinity for douchebaggery is well-documented and frighteningly Pavlovian. If it wasn't, "Jersey Shore" wouldn't be a smash hit and Ronnie and The Sitch would be getting paid minimum wage to fill potholes on the Garden State Parkway with asphalt as God intended. But ladies, we men are finally becoming hip to your crazy jive. We are evolving. Into a mongoloid race of impertinent pricks who mug your knights in shining armor, steal their money, and use it to buy you drinks. After we give them swirlys.

Exhibit A: I was at Butterfield 8 last night for karaoke and had just finished singing "Brown Eyed Girl". Better than Van Morrison. Because that poor bastard's career peaked BEFORE the Auto-Tune Era. I get back to my bar stool and as I'm contemplating whether to sing "With or Without You" or "Build Me Up Buttercup" next, this smokin' hot chick sidles right up to me and puts out a vibe tantamout to a big neon sign that reads "Open for Business, Stud". My intrigue is purely academic, however, because I'm dating someone right now and although I am MANY things, a cheater is not one of them. My curiousity is doubly piqued by a quasi-morbid fascination with what I refer to as "Murphy's Law of Female Attraction", which states that "the NANOSECOND a man is off the market, every woman in a 50-mile radius who has ignored, dismissed or rejected him will find him irresistably sexy and desirable". Because women - although far more beautiful, far more intelligent and far better smelling than men - are batshit crazy like that. Men are from Mars, but women are not from Venus - they're from the Seventh Circle of Hell and have been sent to Earth by Beelzebub to torture the male sex for all eternity. Anyway, the following conversation between me and the smokin' hottie ensued:

Hottie: oh my God, I LOVE "Brown Eyed Girl"!
Me: everyone does
Hottie: and you have a great voice!
Me: I know
Hottie: haha, you're funny!
Me: I know that too
Hottie: you're also really cute
Me: you're 3-for-3
Hottie: do you have a girlfriend?
Me: that's none of your business
Hottie: that means you do
Me: whatever you say, Nancy Drew
Hottie: I'm gonna give you my number anyway
Me: I'm not gonna call you
Hottie: why not?
Me: I don't want to
Hottie: just take it...call me if things don't work out with your girlfriend
Me: I have herpes
Hottie: eew, really?
Me: no
Hottie: then why'd you say that?
Me: I just wanted to see if you actually HAVE a limit, woman...congratulations, yours is VD

Enjoy more Curmudgeonly content at http://celticcurmudgeon.com/

Michael Moore Proves He is Fucking Retarded.



Here , the founding members of the "Fuck Mike Moore" fan club assemble.


Hey Mike--SHUT THE FUCK UP!!

I saw you on The View yesterday and we listened to your arguments.   You generally have much more depth to your points, and frankly yesterday it seemed that you were grasping at straws.  For those of you who missed it, here is the video clip courtesty of The View: 

You argue that we should have captured Osama Bin Laden, not killed him.  You argue that we tried Nazi's and we should have tried OBL, not killed him. 

In case you have not noticed, the world is quite different
than it was in 1945.   Why waste our tax dollars trying
known terrorists, especially when they try to kill
in attempting to evade capture. 

The main point you miss, you fat liberal fuck is that our Special Forces, you know...Seal Team 6 were under fire.  Their lives were at risk.  You are arguing we should have captured the towel head, not shot him.  I think that might have put our military forces at an even greater risk. 

We already have hamstrung our military in terms of the "new rules of engagement".  Are you proposing we take those rules further and make it even more difficult to be an effective military?  Give me a break, and find something else to smoke.

We don't have anything to hide Mike...and we also don't need to waste lives trying to capture a dead man walking.  So shut the fuck up and go lose some weight.  Maybe you should start eating your own hubris.

Your piece on Columbine was good.  The rest of your work seems to continue to just roll down hill.  Perhaps you and Spike Lee,  should get into bed and make a real bleeding heart liberal piece of shit documentary next. 

And one more time...Hey Mike:  SHUT THE FUCK UP!!

--The Angry Trader.

The Now Infamous New Orleans Police Horse Slapping Incident, Part II

When we last left off, dear readers, I had just been arrested and charged with two counts of “Cruelty to Animals” for vigorously petting a police horse while drunk, shirtless and dancing a jig in the middle of Bourbon Street. Let’s continue…

The New Orleans Police Department is notorious for two things: 1) employing some of the biggest douchebags alive and 2) going out of their way to humiliate any Yankee guilty of even the most venial of offenses. By the time I arrived at the NOPD station, I had been informed umpteen times by the skinny dipshit dork of a cop who arrested me that I was lucky he wasn’t going to have me booked on two counts of “Striking a Police Officer”. The temptation to reply to his insipid claptrap with some variation on “dude, it’s not my fault you were the biggest loser in your high school class and still don’t know what a breast feels like” was tempered by the realization that my Miranda Rights did nothing to guarantee I would not be taken into a holding cell and Tased for the enjoyment of a bunch of badge-wearing hicks. So I kept my mouth shut. While I was being “processed” at the station, I was shackled – hands, feet and all – to a “bench of shame” with three other hard-core criminals guilty of such offenses as “Public Drunkenness”, “Public Urination” and “Publically Insinuating That All Southerners Are Flaming Racists”. Which they are. I was still shirtless, mind you, and it was freezing in that station, so even though my eight bad-ass tatts were out in the open to lend me “street cred”, I could probably have picked the lock on my shackles with my nipples if the laws of physics had been more cooperative.

New Orleans cops love to take their sweet ass time filling out paperwork, and even though I suspect this is because they’re sick enough in the head to enjoy the anxiety that an impending visit to jail causes all white yuppies, it probably has more to do with the fact that they are semi-literate at best, which would explain why they couldn’t get a real job in the private sector. Sixty minutes after my arrival at the station, Officer Assbag finally figured out how to write the postal abbreviation for Connecticut in kindergarten-style block letters in the “State of Residence” box on my booking form and it was time for me to be transferred to the Orleans Parish Prison (hereafter referred to as the “OPP”).

The ride from the police station to the OPP was an absolute debacle. For whatever reason, I was put into the back seat of a police cruiser whose primary use MUST have been transporting Oompa Loompas who stole Everlasting Gobstoppers from the Wonka Factory. I had to sit SIDEWAYS just to fit in that taxpayer-subsidized death trap. Making matters worse, I had a neighbor in the back seat: a Latino crackhead who spent the first five minutes of the ride threatening to kill the cop driving the car and, after I erupted into a fit of giggles at his stereotypical ridiculousness, spent the last ten minutes of the ride threatening to cut me. As an aside, I must say that the cop driving the car was a exceptionally good sport because not only did he refuse to acknowledge the crackhead’s idiotically psychotic threats, he joined me in laughing at that asshole for the final few minutes of the ride. When we arrived at the OPP, I could barely breathe I was laughing so hard.

The “admissions” process at the OPP is very slow, very deliberate and designed to make you wish General Sherman had hung a right at Savannah and burned New Orleans to the ground. After being chained to another “bench of shame” for an hour, I was thoroughly and generously searched, told to strip down to my underwear (which didn’t take long because I was still shirtless) while my possessions were confiscated and inventoried, and finally given an orange jumpsuit that said “OPP Inmate” on the back. Thank God I was still shitfaced because otherwise I think I would have been pooping my pants. Instead, I found it all rather amusing.

Attired like a convicted felon, I was tossed into a holding cell with approximately 40 black men, 1 other white man, and the aforementioned Latino crackhead. This was the moment in which I discovered once and for all just how batshit crazy I really am. If you’d told me a week earlier that I would find myself in a Louisiana jail with the demographic deck stacked so heavily against me, I’m positive I would have been terrified. Nosce te ipsum – “know thyself”. Clearly I didn’t know jack shit about myself, because when I entered that holding cell my alcohol-soaked prefrontal cortex had decided that if anyone so much as looked at me the wrong way, they were going down. If you’re thinking to yourself “oh my God, what a friggin idiot”, you have reacted correctly. I mean, my God, I’m from one of the richest, whitest towns in America. A town where a shoving match is a “rumble” and where we tolerate a maximum of two minority families at any one time. To this day I shudder at the thought of what might have happened if someone had actually started with me. The headline would probably have read something like “Stupid Yankee Starts Race Riot in OPP, Is Beaten To Death With Own Dismembered Limbs by Fellow Inmates”. Because I’m sure the writers at the Times-Picayune are giant douchebags too. But lo! I was sorely mistaken about the demeanor and temperament of freshly-incarcerated men! Remember the first episode of “Arrested Development”, when Michael goes to visit his father in prison and his dad goes, “I am having the TIME OF MY LIFE”? Not a joke. Totally accurate. Aside from the severe alcohol withdrawal that kicked in around Hour Twelve and the debilitating hunger (which I refused to sate with one of the “Aged Baloney on Generic Wonderbread” sandwiches they tossed at us), I was about to make many new BFFs.

Now when the door to the holding cell slammed behind me, the first thing I noticed was that the more muscular black dudes had taken the top portions of their jumpsuits off to flash their guns. I immediately decided that this was the route that I myself should take, so off came the top of my jumpsuit. Hoping to God that none of my cellmates mistook my Celtic tatts for Neo-Nazi symbols, I put my best “don’t f**k with me I’m a badass” face on and took a spot on the bench that ran around the perimeter of the cell. Within ten seconds, the only other white guy in there (an emaciated, middle-aged guy with a bushy grey beard) got up and walked over to where I was sitting. “Do you mind if I join you, pal?” he said. This was the chance I had been hoping for to prove my hardcore chops. “Yeah, I DO mind”, I replied. “Go back to your own f**king seat and leave me alone.” The hurt that surfaced on this poor man’s countenance in response to my harsh rejoinder nearly tore my heart in two, but this was the State of Nature and I was the only guy in that room that had even heard of Thomas Hobbes. The man turned and walked away, and I saw a few of the black guys raise their eyebrows at each other as if to say, “that pale gentleman sure is crazy”. Mission accomplished.

I managed to fall asleep for about 30 minutes after that. Now let me ask you: is there anything worse than waking up from a dream in which you are sandwiched between two naked Swedish bikini models on a Jamaican beach, only to find that you are surrounded by criminals who may or may not want to violate you in the worst possible way? The answer to that riddle is “no”. That said, my initial panic upon waking was quickly assuaged by a tap on the shoulder from the guy who would become my prison “Buddha” for the next 20 hours – Jerome from St. Louis. “Hey, wake up, baby”, he said, “this ain’t no place to be nappin!” I realized that this young man possessed the kind of street wisdom I could benefit from, so I replied, “Yeah, I hear you, man, I’m just so goddamn drunk!” Jerome thought this was hilarious and so did about ten other guys within earshot. In that moment I became the resident comedian. And I decided to press this advantage with all the vigor I could muster:

“You hear the one about the dumb cracka who built a submarine with a screen door?” Hysterical laughter.

“My momma is so fat, her blood type is Rocky Road!” That was a big hit too because apparently black people haven’t watched an Eddie Murphy movie since “The Golden Child”. And for the record my mother is incredibly fit. Sorry, mama, I had to throw you under the bus to ensure I would one day see you again.

“Whaddya call a white woman with one leg shorter than the other? Eileen!” One older guy with no teeth actually fell off his bench at that one. It didn't seem to matter that these were the WORST JOKES EVER TOLD.

I grew bolder: “Why is it that all you brothas be diggin on white women with huge asses?” Peals of laughter echoed off the walls for 10 seconds. Unfortunately no one actually answered my question – they didn’t realize how badly I’ve always wanted to know the answer to that mystery.

Things were going swimmingly. Anyone within earshot of me was having a jolly good time in jail. To the great relief of my conscience, even the middle-aged white guy seemed to be enjoying himself - in spite of the verbal flogging I’d given him. But I'd forgotten about the Latino crackhead, who had been tweak-pacing back and forth from one end of the cell to the other the entire time, oblivious to what was going on around him. Then, all of a sudden, he came to a dead stop ten feet in front of me, turned, looked me right in the eye, and said, “You, white boy, I told you I was gonna cut you mothaf**ka!” Dead silence. Everyone waited with baited breath to see how the funny-ass white boy with all the weird tatts would handle the sociopath who had threatened to murder him for the 20th time that night. I initially hesitated, not really sure what to do and a little fearful that this could escalate to a fight and land me in the hole. Then I remembered one of my all-time favorite movie lines, uttered by middle linebacker Alvin Mack of ECU in “The Program”: “you about to have 250 pounds of pissed of [n-word] up yo ass!” Should I? Hell yes.

“You listen to me, crackhead, and you listen good. If you don’t sit down and shut the f**k up, you gonna have 250 pounds of pissed off white boy up yo ass!” Not having had a seismograph handy at the time, I conservatively estimate that the ensuing laughter registered a 7.2 on the Richter scale. It actually got so silly that one of the guards came over to the bars and screamed at us to “shut the f**k up” or he “would take five of [us] to general population”. I loudly announced that he “can’t do that because it constitutes unreasonable search and seizure and therefore violates our Fourth Amendment rights”, which is totally untrue but triggered another round of risible hilarity.

In the interest of time I’m going to end this part of the story here, but not before I leave you with one final anecdote: about 18 hours into my incarceration I was FINALLY taken out of the cell and given a chance to post bail. In the OPP you wait for the bail clerk to call your name in a wide open section of the prison and you’re mixed right in with the female prisoners. A few chairs away from me sat a drop-dead gorgeous stripper who was eyeing me like a starving tiger eyes a gazelle carcass. With my outstanding peripheral vision I was able to watch her watching me and eventually I became so unnerved that I wheeled around, faced her, and asked her what the crap she wanted. She looked me dead in the eye, donned her best stripper smile, and said, “Hey white boy – if you bail me out I’ll [censored for explicit sexual content].

Stay tuned for the final chapter in this epic tale, in which I am finally released from prison (after a round of teary-eyed fist and chest bumps with my new friends), return to Bourbon Street in a state that closely resembles insulin shock, drink two pitchers of beer in ten minutes, threaten to beat the crap out of a smelly old guy who tried to sell me cocaine and refused to take “no” for an answer, and help Mean Joe D complete the 54-bar pub crawl.

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Connecticut Cowboy Fans? Almost as Bad as Illinois Nazis...

I am a rabid New York Giants fan. My hatred for the Dallas Cowboys (and, to a very slightly lesser extent, the Philadelphia Eagles) is visceral, perpetual, and at times borders on the kind of psychosis usually found only in North Korean politics. Any team that calls itself "America's Team" and cuts a hole in the roof of its stadium so that "God can watch the Cowboys play" deserves to have its players, personnel and fans die of bubonic plague or syphilis. Or better yet, both. These things having been said, I cannot condemn a native Texan for being a Cowboys fan. I can and will throw beer bottles at his/her head, but I can't condemn them. But when I see a native of the Tri-State Area wearing a Cowboys jersey in MY BAR and cheering against the Giants, I will do everything I can to make sure they leave the bar crying. During today's Giants/Redskins game (a total debacle, by the way...we got our asses kicked by Rex Grossman...REX GROSSMAN...that's the rough equivalent of being dumped by Anne Ramsey) a very hot but equally annoying young woman in a Cowboys t-shirt made the mistake of cheering when the Redskins took the lead in the third quarter. A highly entertaining (for me, at least) example of the effectiveness of Socratic dialogue ensued. One disclaimer before I relay the content of this conversation: my use of the word "whore" is frequent, always in jest and never malicious. I use this word multiple times a day, always in the spirit of Ron Burgundy, never in the spirit of Ike Turner. If you find such language/humor "offensive" because you're incapable of distinguishing between "tongue-in-cheek" and "literal", I suggest a hasty departure from my website. Seriously, what the hell are you even doing here? Aren't you late for tea at Gloria Steinem's house? Moving on...

Female Cowboys Fan: woo hoo, Giants suck!

Me: shut your pie hole

FCF: haha, you guys are losing to the Redskins!

Me: you're in CONNECTICUT...you have a NEW YORK accent...explain your Cowboy jersey, woman

FCF: well, the first pro game I went to was at Cowboy Stadium and it was amazing!

Me: so?? are you still in love with the first guy you had sex with??

FCF: [totally caught off guard] well, umm...yeah, actually...I guess I still kinda am

Me: that's very interesting, whore

FCF: [laughing in spite of her shock] excuse me??

Me: I called you a whore...and you're dying to hear me tell you why, aren't you?

FCF: [too proud to say "yes" but too curious to say "no" - remains silent]

Me: qui tacet consentire videtur, therefore I shall tell you [I studied Latin for 8 years and the only thing it's given me in return is the occasional opportunity to cudgel someone who displeases me with classical idioms - this particular phrase means "those who remain silent will be assumed to have consented"]

FCF: [equal parts amused, intrigued and apprehensive]

Me: well, you've admitted to loving two things that were "firsts" for you, have you not?

FCF: yeah, so?

Me: how many people would you say end up in meaningful, long-term relationships with the first person they loved?

FCF: not many

Me: correct...and would you agree that someone who is still hung up on their first love has difficulty giving their heart to another?

FCF: I would

Me: and you are one such person, by your own admission, are you not?

FCF: I suppose

Me: now, are you currently sexually active?

FCF: yeah, of course...how can anyone live without sex?

Me: so you admit, then, to sleeping with people you can't possibly love because you are still hung up on the first guy you slept with?

FCF: [finally beginning to catch on] now wait a minute...

Me: no, no, let me finish crushing you in the iron grip of reason

FCF: [looks at me like she can't decide whether she wants to punch me or go home with me]

Me: now, what label do we traditionally apply to women who sleep with men they are incapable of loving?

FCF: ok ok I get it

Me: I rest my case, whore

For the record, I bought this woman a drink a few minutes later. I buy other women breakfast sometimes for a related reason. I may be a monumental prick, but I am NOT a monster. Bottom line, that woman kept her Cowboy-loving mouth shut for the remainder of the Giants/Redskins game.

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The Now-Infamous New Orleans Police Horse Slapping Incident, Part I

I consider myself a semi-reasonable man. I accept the fact that in this beautiful but crazy, fallen world, shit happens. Life is not fair, and anyone who believes otherwise either writes screenplays for Disney or drinks before 5pm on a regular basis. But what happened to me in New Orleans this past May is so ri-goddamn-diculous that I'm forced to consider the possibility that God is on the payroll at National Lampoon. Let me explain...

In late April I got a phone call from onetime coworker, current drinking buddy and perpetual man-whore "Mean Joe D". I was staying with friends in Houston at the time and MJD, who had just been let go by the same bald poser that fired me two years ago (as an aside, let me note for the record that said poser - a doppelganger for Uncle Fester - managed a once-great sell-side technology research boutique so incompetently that its parent company was forced to shut it down completely about a month ago), had decided to spend some time driving around this great country of ours. Joe informed me that he had a buddy in New Orleans who could get us a comped hotel room for three nights and wondered if I would be interested in joining him in a pub crawl down Bourbon St. Outside of my very busy schedule of eating, sleeping and relieving myself, I didn't have a lot going on at the time, so I agreed to accompany him. Now before we go any further, there are a few things you need to know about MJD and the Tucker-Max-type shit that ALWAYS happens when he and I tie one on:

1. MJD is the son of narcoleptic gypsies. Ok I made that up. But it's the only logical explanation I've ever been able to come up with for his frighteningly uncanny ability to sleep anytime, anywhere (and frequently, with anyone) over the course of a nine-day bender.
2. MJD was a collegiate gymnast. This is important because it plays a key role later on in this story. It's also why he looks like a 'roided-up circus midget.
3. The last time I saw MJD before this New Orleans trip was in San Francisco (his adopted hometown). During what was supposed to be a seven-day BUSINESS trip he and I managed to: a) visit a whopping six clients (monumental hangovers are not conducive to marketing, it would seem); b) convince five female flight attendants at an SF nightclub that I was the fourth line center for the San Jose Sharks (they were fighting over me like a pride of lions fights over an antelope carcass...it was beautiful); c) get thrown out of not one but two Marina-district bars because MJD was determined to hit on any chick with a pulse and - when they responded unfavorably to his overtures, which they nearly always did - would ask them if they had profiles on "match.fat.com”; d) topple a 20-ft Christmas tree in the Marina and set it on fire in front of 50 cheering bar patrons. Ok that last one was all me but I distinctly remember Joe tapping me on the shoulder and saying, "I bet you’re too chicken to climb to the top of that Christmas tree". Nobody calls me chicken, Needles, nobody. I actually tore my jeans in half during that fiasco and since I was going commando at the time I had to walk around town wearing what amounted to a denim loin cloth for the rest of the night.

In short, MJD is a giant bucket of lecherous douche - just like me. That's why we get along so well. It's also why I had a pretty good idea going into this New Orleans trip that something absurd and probably illegal was going to happen. Moving on...

For brevity's sake, I'm going to provide a quick, expedition-log-type summary of our first 48 hours in the French Quarter then move on to the night in question:

Arrived at hotel...no time for shower, getting right to work...our objective is to hit all 54 bars on Bourbon St (not including restaurants and strip clubs, although we may or may not have entered some of those as well) in four days...we start with the gay bars and tear through those as quickly as possible - one drink only, guaranteeing we're not there nearly long enough to risk finding out that there’s been a flaming homosexual lying dormant inside each of us our entire lives...the next four blocks are a blur of beer, frozen Hurricanes, drunk chicks and their even drunker asshole boyfriends (yes, asshole-dom is axiomatic to any guy who brings a girl he purports to like to this modern-day Gomorrah), human statues, awesome jazz and blues clubs, and Bourbon St.’s patented proprietary odoriferous blend of booze, sweat, sex, urine and horse manure…we somehow manage to stumble back to our hotel occasionally for a few hours of fitful sleep, and I somehow manage to stumble onto one of the greatest bait-and-switch schemes of all time: in the four days I was in New Orleans, I managed to convince 31 different women that my nonexistent brother was the curator of the Smithsonian and that he had asked me to help him get pictures of modern-day American men and women reenacting that famous V-Day picture of the Navy guy dipping and kissing some nurse in Times Square for a “65th Anniversary of V-Day” exhibit at the museum (needless to say, every last one of them fell for it, proving once and for all that women will do just about anything in the name of romantic nostalgia...fellas, write that down)...I also manage to break 1,000 on that “Punch Strength Tester” arcade game (kinda like that thing Ivan Drago does in “Rocky IV”), after which MJD sees the wisdom in affording me a little more goddamn respect than I usually get from him…oh, we ate some oysters at one point – and not much else.

Ok so that more or less gives you the gist of everything that happened prior to the events that would take me from giving an impromptu, shirtless performance of “Riverdance” in the middle of Bourbon St. to a 24-hour stint in the Orleans Parish Prison (the “O.P.P.”, as we inmates called it) to a glorious return to the French Quarter to finish the 54-bar pub crawl. Here we go…

By 10pm on Saturday night – the third day of our Bacchic Odyssey – MJD and I were so ripped that we became telepathically connected and contemporaneously decided it would be a good idea to take our shirts off and keep them off whether we were in a bar, out on the street, or passed out in the gutter (which Joe more or less did twice that day, the only two times I’ve ever seen a man sleep standing up in the middle of what amounted to a boiling cauldron of booze and lust). You see, MJD weighs about 100 lbs less than I do, and while on a pound-for-pound basis he’s much stronger than me, he can’t hold my jockstrap when it comes to the “game of drink”. Like all survivors, however, Joe’s DNA has mutated to the point where he has the most highly-evolved case of narcolepsy I’ve ever seen. The problem is, the minute he wakes up he starts acting like an alcoholic, hypoglycemic albino grizzly rising from a multi-month hibernation.

MJD had been stand-sleeping next to me at the bar for a little over an hour when all of a sudden I hear “aaaaarrrrrggggghhh…get me a beer…any beer…domestic…import…just get me a goddamn beer immediately”. Joe’s ursine rise from the dead scared the crap out of the girl I had been talking to (and by talking, I mean serenading with a slurred, drunken but likely passable rendition of “Could You Be Loved” by Bob Marley) but she was a good sport and, after several beers, a few shots and a Red Bull and vodka slushie (there’s no other way to describe it – in New Orleans they have frozen versions of every cocktail imaginable) we followed her outside to meet her friends. One of these friends was wearing a Carolina Panthers jersey, which Joe and I – both tactically Kitchener-esque vis-à-vis determining which colonies of women are likely to produce the highest possible debaucherous yield – instantly recognize as an invitation to talk about football rather than something insipidly stupid like “the weather” or “life”. Such a topic of conversation does, after all, stack the odds of success in our favor. Furthermore, these were SOUTHERN girls, which means that they were 50% more likely to go back to our hotel room with us than their Northern counterparts. It’s not that Southern girls are “loose” (well, some of them are beyond loose), it’s just that they’re far more susceptible to Yankee charm than their wife-beater-wearing, shotgun-wielding, racist fathers would ever be willing to admit under threat of waterboarding. Game on.

Joe is the first to enter the verbal fray – he’s kind of like the Marine Reconn of semantic canoodling – but my strength lies elsewhere. Namely, in my surprising ability to dance nimbly despite weighing over 240 lbs. So as Joe butters these girls up with innuendo-laced compliments, I begin limbering up. Stretch out the hammies, the glutes, the thighs. A few jumping jacks. Three more beers. One more Jame-O shot. I’m ready.

Now I was a good athlete in my day, but I’m no Michael Flatley. That said, I can jig with the best of the men of my weight class and color and I was putting on a rather good performance on this particular night. I couldn’t see straight, mind you, but I could still dance. After about 60 seconds I was so winded I thought about calling for a gurney, but Joe – excellent wingman that he is – spelled me with some of his own acrobatic splendor. Joe used to do backflips right on the street but he broke his neck in a tragic kiln explosion a few years back and no longer risks it. He does, however, walk on his hands for the enjoyment of any group of girls likely to reward him with a handful of oats or a free grope or two. MJD was on his game this night, which pleased me to the extent that it increased our collective chances of success but also pissed me off because I’m as competitive as they come and he was just plain showing me up. I decided, therefore, that it would be necessary to redouble my jigging efforts and perhaps throw in a few extra moves I learned from a homeless black guy in Myrtle Beach several years ago. And so, once again, I began to dance. Oh how I danced! I was about to parlay a spin into a full split (yes, I can still do one) when I got drilled in the back by something large, heavy and powerful. Recovering my balance, I wheeled around and came face to face with one of Bourbon St.’s many mounted police officers. I was so relieved that I hadn’t been attacked by an actual human being that I made the mistake of patting the horse on the neck. It may have been a vigorous pat but it was a friendly one. Seriously, if you took 25 years off my age, dressed me up like Jon-Benet Ramsey, gave me blond curls but allowed me to retain my current strength it would have looked like a scene from “Shirley Temple Goes to the Kentucky Derby, Punches Horse In Neck”. The next thing I know, I’m surrounded by three New Orleans cops who are pointing Tasers at me and screaming at me to turn around and put my hands on the wall. I was flabbergasted, but not so flabbergasted that I couldn’t imagine what 50,000 volts administered via metal pins sticking into my bare flesh would feel like, so I instantly complied. I was patted down, handcuffed, led off to the police station like a common criminal, and booked on two counts of “Cruelty to Animals”. TWO counts. Because apparently I patted the horse twice. This is the kind of math that makes New Orelans cops the BIGGEST DOUCHEBAGS ON THE PLANET. In the unlikely event that any of them are reading this, I would like to give them a message: like Maximus, I WILL have my vengeance - in this life or the next. You will NOT get away with turning me into a drunk, white Michael Vick.

In Part II of this epic tale I will discuss my time in prison with what appeared to have been – exclusively – the patrons of the Dexter Lake Club. Plus one other white guy. And a Latino crackhead who threatened to cut me. To be continued.

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