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)"
First off, watch this video. It 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 Needs a Makeover
Bill Black is a brilliant guy, with an encyclopedic knowledge of fraud and crony capitalism and banking misdeeds. He is extremely articulate. And he is hilarious.
But he needs makeover.
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 crap that's behind him in every video. Is this not obvious to everyone?
Bill, 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 that listens to you gets it. But they have to actually listen to you. And in the YouTube age… listening generally is accompanied by visuals.
Please do no take this the wrong way… I actually appreciate that you don't give a crap about how you look. It makes you that much more authentic. But you have already established your authenticity.
Americans are superficial. 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. For me it doesn't matter. Apparently Paul Jay doesn't care either (Paul, put some pressure on Bill). But a good chunk of the other 300,000,000 people in this country go with that visual first impression.
Bill, The Real News is not a radio program. We can see you. You are holding a phone up to your head. Paul, what are you thinking? Tell Bill about this whole video thing.
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 pissed off that they are too captured to have immediately enlisted your service. And you should be. I am. They are a bunch of a-holes. 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 will want to visually associate you with being the hard-assed and brilliant prosecutor that you are. For that to happen, unfortunately, you have to come closer to looking like you would when you are heading into court to take on the elite criminals of our generation.
