Yip - It really was an Inside Job

I'm usually a year late when it comes to movies. Friends look at me kinda funny when I ask 'Hey did you see that movie _________?' (fill in a blockbuster).
"Rory that was out last year."
When I do go to the movies and catch something when it's brand spanking new - it's usually a bomb (I can't believe my wife and I paid money to sit through 'Skyline' or 'Gabriel)'. The last good movie I saw at the cinema was 300 which must have been a couple of years ago now.

I'm even further behind with documentaries. As luck would have it however I caught up with the 2010 documentary 'Inside Job' tonight. And by God I'm glad I did. Narrated by Matt Damon (presumably because he believes in the message the documentary carries), it points the finger at those responsible for the crash of both the American and the world's economy. It shows how utterly irresponsible Wall Street financiers were in their behaviour and more. The worst part for me is the ludicrous bonuses some of the top executives have walked away with for performances which can only be defined as 'catastrophic' and no, it's not company money they are picking up - it's the money you pay in taxes which went to them as bail outs. Billions of dollars in bonuses to be precise. Really, if you haven't seen this incredibly revealing documentary and are interested in why there's only downwardly mobile people in society today, then you must.

There's a bit of a controversial figure who pops his talking head into the frame to make some very telling observations, Dominic Strauss-Kahn. He states that as head of the IMF he saw the crash coming, as did many in Europe, that the correct intervention could have avoided or mitigated it - and as he put it "The world's economic system collapsed, the richest maintained their security and as ever, the poorest in society picked up the bill." Such critical words (and many more) from someone with so much power and influence make him ripe for removing from his position with maybe a sex....oh yeah I missed that too. Been done.

In all honesty, I have no opinion one way or another on the merits of the allegations against Strauss-Kahn, I read today that they have been dropped. If the Chambermaid was indeed a victim then my heart goes out to her and I would have hoped he got the book thrown at him. It does strike me as odd however that the last person to take on Wall Street, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, suffered a similar fate resulting in removal from position and that's before we get to those who just take on the 'establishment' - Scott Ritter et al. I say this because Obama had the opportunity to name and shame those responsible for the mess the American economy is in, he has the chance to make genuine reforms to ensure such a thing never happens again - disappointingly he's backed off. In fact he doesn't appear to me as an outsider to be laying the blame for the crisis on anyone in particular, just generalisations about previous administrations and bankers. I think this may well be why one commentator, Robert Gnaizda, who was formerly with the Greenlining Institute, a housing advocacy group - says toward the end of the documentary "It's a Wall Street Government".

After watching this documentary - I don't want to believe it, but I do. The evidence is all there.

Rory