Lost in America as Metaphor for Mortgage Meltdown

Shawn Wolfe says:

This is what happens when an annoying asshole (Wall Street) loses everything in a casino (the stock market) and desperately begs the house (Congress) to "correct" their little mistake (massive bail out), and the house (Gary Marshall) ain't havin' it.

I think it is also instructive here that this scene takes place at 4am. Albert Brooks is in his bathrobe. His pants are basically down. The owner of the Desert Inn is granting him a sit-down and happens to be dressed in a suit and tie and oak desk.

"The Desert Inn has heart... The Desert Inn has heart... The Desert Inn has heart..."

"We're through talking."

[#1 posted by Metronicity , September 30, 2008 9:53 AM]

Excellent! Maybe Bush, McCain and his cohorts can work on associating Christmas with Wall Street - "There aint gonna be a Christmas - you can blame us".

BTW it's "we're finished talking".

[#2 posted by billmarrs , September 30, 2008 9:59 AM]

lol, that clip was like the opposite of watching a pitch on Mad Men.

[#3 posted by TedJohnson , September 30, 2008 10:13 AM]

Perfect. One of my all time favorite movies.

Watch Brooks' mood change when he thinks he's making progress, and when he encounters a setback. That's the stock market fluctuating.

This metaphor would be even better if this were the FOURTH time in a month that Brooks came scraping to Marshall, and asking for the biggest bailout yet.

Watch Awkward Loan Interview from The Daily Show.

[#4 posted by TedJohnson , September 30, 2008 10:16 AM]

Sorry, this is the correct link to Awkward Loan Interview from The Daily Show.

[#5 posted by william , September 30, 2008 10:26 AM]

Just to be clear, we shouldn't bail out Wall Street because they want it. Fuck them and the Ferraris they rode in on.

We should do it because we don't want a collapse of the financial system, and because it's cheaper to clean up the mess all at once rather than doing it one bank failure at a time.

[#6 posted by mdh , September 30, 2008 11:11 AM]

I feel very much like they just told up to step between their bookie and their knees.

[#7 posted by rrsafety , September 30, 2008 11:31 AM]

"and the house (Gary Marshall) ain't havin' it. "

To make this on point, shouldn't that actually read: "and the house (conservative Republicans in the Congress) ain't havin' it."

??

[#8 posted by Johnny Cat , September 30, 2008 1:26 PM]

One of my cherished titles as well.

"I've seen the future! And it's a bald-headed man from New York!" Substitute DC for NY, and you got another applicable metaphor.

[#9 posted by Foolster41 , September 30, 2008 3:28 PM]

An apt metaphor.

I don't think I would be as nice as the casino guy was. I would tell the guy he's crazy and he doesn't understand how reality works.

[#10 posted by Anonymous , September 30, 2008 5:20 PM]

Harolds in Reno might have given Einstein here his nest egg back.

They did this occasionally when someone had foolishly gotten in over their head, and rather than a run on the casino bank, it created enormous positive word of mouth, and helped bring in the average joe, as opposed to the typical hood or compulsive gambler.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/theymadeamerica/whomade/rsmith_hi.html discussses this a bit, but the book this PBS mini series was created from goes into more detail.

Of course, that is sort of like making mortgages seem safe as a lure to bring in more people into bad deals.

[#11 posted by O_P , October 2, 2008 2:43 PM]

Is Albert Brooks actually meant to be funny? Or is the fact he's not really funny part of his appeal?
I don't get him at all.