CHARITY BEGINS AT GOLMAN SACHS AND OTHER MISCONCEPTIONS

Lots of people seem pretty out of touch with reality these days, which is understandable given the grim facts of life lately. The Greeding Frenzy of 2008 where people who were already very wealthy figured they ought to start stealing in a big way still has our economy in a shambles. Two wars are still being waged by a president who promised to end them. Terror zombies are strapping on exploding underwear and boarding airplanes. That evil bit of anti-Bill Of Rights legislation still stands, the cynically named Patriot Act. Gay Americans are still being treated as America's New Nigger, both in and out of our military, and Sarah Palin still hasn't gone away. Is it any wonder we retreat from from reality? This state of affairs does make for some interesting misconceptions, however. Consider:

The bankers at Goldman Sachs, poised to award around 12.5 billion bucks of their stockholders' dough in bonuses to their wealthy executive corps, figure they can avoid public outrage by insisting that these executives donate a portion of their money to charity. Yeah, knowing that super wealthy unindicted coconspirators are making tax-deductible contributions to some silly save-the-whales-from-the-dolphins charity ought to take the sting out of wondering why you bothered to get an education so you can wind up living in your car and working as a greeter at Walmart for minimum wage and no benefits just so these people can live like Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. Seems sort of over-optimisitic on the bankers' part.

The Senate has reconstituted the Health Care Reform Bill to something that needs to be called The Same Old Health Care Continuation Decree and announce they they found health care in the United Sates to be perfect and in no need of reform. Why else would they eliminate the Public Option, the only reason for the bill's introduction? They figured, what the hell, private health insurers already have Death Panels, they've had them for many years, and Senators wanted in on some of that life and death power. So they gutted the bill, thus condemning hundreds of thousands of Americans to death for the crime of being not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid or well off enough to afford health insurance.

If these senators figure this will make them heroes to their voters, that's a fairly huge misconception since the majority of Americans fall into that middle category and want nothing more than their Senator's head on a pike right now. Perhaps politicians can be excused for being out of touch with reality since that seems to be an industry-related disability. Which is probably why Senators and Congressmen have one of the best health plans anywhere. And the don't pay a nickel for it.

President Obama seems pretty okay with these Senators doing a cha-cha on his health care reform bill, maybe thinking he'll use the money saved on keeping America healthy to invade Yemen to make a whole lot of Yemenites unhealthy and to avenge the exploding underwear guy. The fact that he denied any plans to send troops there shows that he's seriously considering it. Why else would the subject even come up? You don't hear him denying plans to invade Lithuania, do you? Being a 2 war president only ties the record. Fighting 3 wars at once would leave a lasting impression, to be sure, although undoubtedly not the one he desires.

Mistaken impressions are epidemic in America, even in the entertainment industry, which usually has its fingers on the public pulse. Jay Leno thought people would rather watch his smarmy ass 5 days a week in prime time instead of their favorite dramas. Conan O'Brien was under the impression that he had enough talent and personal appeal to carry the Tonight Show, and the company that employs both these men, NBC, thought they were on to a good thing, saving the high production costs as well as the salaries of actors, writers, directors and technicians. It seems they can all guess again.

As it happens, people prefer Law & Order to Jay Walking at 10 P.M., and they were just fine with late night talk shows being broadcast, well, late at night, which was the whole idea, what with them being called late night and all. Luckily, NBC screwing up such a lucrative set up has dissuaded Good Morning America from their planned move to the noon time slot so the anchor people could sleep late. For most of us, our misconceptions don't cost millions of dollars, or in the case of huge banks and the government, billions and trillions. The misconception most of us have is that wealthy executives and elected officials will be held accountable just like any other human being who screws up. Turns out not to be the case. Our own errors in judgement are for the most part not on a monumental enough scale to be overlooked. Perhaps we're just thinking too small. If we all go batshit crazy we'll be mainstream.