Courtesy of Jaime Falcon.
Original title: “Bill Black: Leaving Felons in Charge of our Banks is Good Policy and Will Lead to Financial Stability (hahaha)”
This is another excellent Bill Black commentary on the insanity that defines our (in)justice system and mainstream media when it comes to addressing financial sector misdeeds. It is a superb 10 minutes.
Now, we Bill Black fans have to discuss a potentially sensitive subject:
Bill Black Must Look More Like A Prosecutor
Bill Black is a brilliant guy, with an encyclopedic knowledge of fraud and crony capitalism and banker misdeeds. He is extremely articulate. And he is hilarious.
I am not suggesting that he do as Lanny Breuer does – dress up like a banker every time he goes on TV. But he has to trim the beard. He has to wear somewhat business-like attire. He cannot be holding a phone up to his head like it’s 1982. And he has to clear away the pile of books that’s behind him in every video.
Prof. Black, I know you don’t want to waste time on such foolishness when you could be skewering and lampooning some bank-defender’s ludicrous assertions in prose, but we have to think about who needs to hear your message. Anyone uncompromised who listens to you gets it. But they have to actually listen to you. And in the YouTube age… listening is accompanied by visuals.
Please do no take this the wrong way… I actually appreciate that you don’t care about how you look. It makes you that much more authentic. But you have already established your authenticity.
Americans are inundated with talking heads in 2013. It is not enough to just be unbelievably smart and articulate. Part of your audience is dismissing you because you look like Paul Jay unexpectedly called you and caught you while you were painting the garage. I think it’s great. Apparently Paul Jay doesn’t mind either. But a good chunk of the other 300,000,000 people in this country go with that visual first impression.
You did get cleaned up when you went before the House Financial Services Committee in 2010. And they basically told you to take a hike. I am guessing that you are somewhat incensed that they are too captured to have immediately enlisted your service. You should be. I am. They are a bunch of corrupt asses. If they were serious about justice, rule-of-law, and/or the health of our democracy, they would have begged you to help sort out the mess.
But they want the Lanny Breuers of the world to handle “litigation” now.. for obvious reasons. We have to fight that. The People must know the name Bill Black. The People must demand Bill Black. But Bill Black has to look like Bill Black sounds. The People need to visually associate you with being the hard-assed and brilliant prosecutor that you are. For that to happen, you should look a little more like you are heading into court to take on the elite criminals of our generation.
Let us consider what you are up against: Republicans, Democrats, Congress, the Executive Branch, the financial sector, most of K Street, mainstream media, the PR industry, and the most powerful crony capitalists in the world. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that we are at a watershed in terms of information dissemination. We have the tools and the platforms to get you out there in spite of mainstream resistance and obstacles. But you still have to clear the stuff off the table behind you. And you need a good microphone and some decent lighting. For $150 you could transform how you are presenting.
Your message is important for this country. If there is even a small chance that we can rally enough of a groundswell to get you appointed, we have to go for it. Fighting crony capitalism is a crazy fight to take on, given the resources and the ruthlessness on the other side. But you are already taking it on. Why make it any harder than it necessary?
