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Unregulated freedom isn’t free

How the mighty have fallen. Economist Paul Krugman cuts no slack for Alan Greenspan, the former longtime chairman of the Federal Reserve.

If [Greenspan] wants to redeem himself through hard and serious reflection about how he got it so wrong, fine — and I’d be interested in listening. If he thinks he can still lecture us from his pedestal of wisdom, he’s wasting our time.

As I’ve said before, I’m appalled by Alan Greenspan’s adherence to the naive ideas of romance novelist Ayn Rand. Upon what rigorous academic research did Rand develop her philosophy? None. She was simply a fanatical anti-Communist with obsessive fantasies about her ideal leading man. That’s it. Nothing more complicated than that, except she happened to be a darn good storyteller. Yet Greenspan bought into her idea that capitalism should mean that anything goes. Only after the damage was done, did he acknowledge the failure of unregulated markets to correct themselves, and now he’s even backpedaling on that.

To recap what happened in 2008, Wall Street played fast and loose with money that came from mortgages that hadn’t been properly underwritten. This was possible because the Glass-Steagall Act of 1932 had been repealed, removing the barrier between investment and commercial banks. The bankers took their gigantic bonuses, then the mortgages dried up, the market tanked, and the financial markets collapsed. After the government bailed out the banks, the bankers kept their bonuses.

This cataclysmic worldwide mess started with the deregulation of American investment banking during the Clinton Administration, under the influence of Alan Greenspan, Bob Rubin, and Lawrence Summers.

Sixties Faces, now in their sixties

Pirate Radio has been sitting in a Netflix envelope for a couple of months, and I finally watched it Friday night. Historically the movie is a mess, fabricating events left and right, and mixing in songs from years beyond the end of the movie, but I’ll take it on faith that it captures something of the spirit of the time in Sixties England, when Pop music was played by illegal, offshore radio stations. BBC Radio 2, my favourite radio station today, came about thanks to pirate radio.

One scene in the movie was obviously staged to draw attention to a picture on a wall.

That’s Jean Shrimpton, the preeminent British model of the 60’s, before Twiggy.

Just as British and American music competed for attention, so did British and American fashion models.

Colleen Corby may not have been a household name like Twiggy was, but you can’t be an American over age 50 and not recognize Colleen’s distinctively lovely and iconic face. Cheryl Tiegs may have made the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue a phenomenon, making her a lust object for men, but Colleen had a different audience, modeling for women’s catalogs and magazines. I became aware of her thanks to having sisters. Colleen Corby was beyond being merely pretty, and she truly defined a class of attractiveness all her own.

Time passes, as it must, and this is Colleen Corby today.

Later, I’ll be talking more about 60’s fashion models, and in particular a promotional tour called Youthquake, and Prue Bury’s part in it.

Ghost memory

Last night we did something we very rarely do on a weeknight, by firing up the video projector to watch a movie. Has it already been ten years since the excellent film adaptation of the Ghost World comic book? It was Scarlett Johansson’s breakthrough role, but I don’t understand why it seemed to put the brakes on Thora Birch’s career, because she’s outstanding as Enid.

Ghost World has one of the more memorable movie openers, by featuring this outrageous dance number from a 1965 Bollywood flick called Gumnaam.

Witches brew

One of the news feeds reported that Annette Funicello’s house caught fire last week. Annette has MS, and has been in a wheelchair for years, and although she suffered smoke inhalation, she got out in time and is recovering.

Annette always brings to mind my favorite Mousketeer, the late Cheryl Holdridge. After The Mickey Mouse Club, in her teens Cheryl had a recurring role on Leave It To Beaver, first as Gloria Cusick, then she was brought back as Julie Foster. After that, Cheryl appeared in various 60’s TV shows, including this memorable episode of Bewitched, where she tries to seduce Darren. The scene at the advertising agency isn’t exactly like Don Draper in action on Mad Men, but at least Darren kept liquor in his office. Make it a double, Samantha!

Musical Massachusetts

Tim Rice’s American Pie series on BBC Radio 2 has finally reached home, here in Massachusetts.

Massachusetts has Boston — the city and the 70’s supergroup — and Aerosmith, The Cars, and the J.Geils Band. On the softer side there’s James Taylor and Arlo Guthrie. Tim Rice covers all of them, but he makes no mention of Jonathan Richman, drivin’ past the Stop & Stop (a supermarket chain that’s still very much a presence here). This clip is from England’s Top of the Pops. That sounds like Steve Wright doing the voice over at the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_eLgvTDLIg

I’ve become something of a fan of the old Ames Brothers act, with Ed Ames singing lead. They’re from Mass., and Rice plays this fun 50’s tune by the bros.


The Ames Brothers – Rag Mop-1950 by CASVI_Factory

Atlas Shrugged

Japan moved about 8 feet, and the Earth’s axis has been tilted by about 6.5 inches, changing the speed of the planet’s rotation and shortening the day by 1.8 millionths of a second. But as horrible as this earthquake is, even upgraded to magnitude 9.0 it’s only the fourth most powerful in my lifetime.

We’ve been planning to buy a new Honda CRV sometime before September. Our ’02 CRV was made in Japan, and not to be petty in my concern about the earthquake, I was nevertheless worried that it would affect the supply. But according to Honda, CRV production is now done mostly in the U.S.