by: Ron Edwards
As lawmakers write legislation to bailout the Wall Street bankers and investment houses, the New Testament Parable of the Unmerciful Servant is strikingly parallel and applicable today. The banks and the financial industrial complex request that the government of the USA bequeath them with a massive bailout, in the ballpark of an unfathomable price tag of $700 billion taxpayer dollars to buttress their bad business decisions and practices.
Meanwhile back on Main Street, Anywhere, USA the taxpayers and their descendants who will pick-up Wall Street's tab are getting foreclosed and harangued by these same financial institutions. The overburdened taxpayers are asked to shoulder this nearly trillion dollar burden. From the exact people that have for years shouted from the mountaintops “free market,” “personal responsibility,” “ownership society,” “the government is the problem, not the solution,” “no welfare checks for the poor,” “no government handouts,” and it goes on and on. The laundry list of rightwing talking points only seem to apply to the poor and downtrodden, God forbid the rich and well connected should actually suffer the same foreclosures, delinquent payments, overdrawn credit cards, and other non-dischargable debt that was legislated and written by these same banking beggars.
In other words, the bankers have been the “unmerciful servants” that Jesus speaks about in Matthew 18:21-35 of the New International Version.
The “Parable of the Unmerciful Servant” begins when Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?"
Then in verse 22, Jesus answered, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.”
Jesus begins to teach through a short story about a a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants.
18:24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents [of gold] was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
26"The servant fell on his knees before him. 'Be patient with me,' he begged, 'and I will pay back everything.' 27The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
In this story, the “king” is the federal government and the “servant” that owes about $700 billion dollars is the banking and finance industry. Now much like today, the king (feds) are negotiating a deal to bailout the debts of the groveling servants (banks). The rich and powerful bankers will no doubt get the taxpayer money. Their bad business practices and unfettered greed has flipped the whole system of American capitalism into American socialism. In 8 short years, the Bush Administration and their corrupt cronies cratered the national economy.
Back to the parable of the unmerciful servant. The unmerciful servent is like the bankers on Wall Street, who are going to get a trillion dollar bailout, but how will the bankers react to the mercy and debt forgiveness from the taxpayers and the feds. Oh yes, you guessed it. The bankers will continue to foreclose on mortgages and throw the taxpayers out of their homes. The big wigs on Wall Street won't reset the A.R.M (adjustable rate mortgages) to keep the loan repayments at a reasonable rate for strapped consumers. They'll continue business as usual, by selling those demonic derivatives and their skanky cousin the credit swap to each other--all the while blaming the dufass sub-prime market. Certainly the bankers will act like the unmerciful servant from Jesus' parable.
We'll pick-up the text from verse 28: "But when that servant [Wall Street bankers] went out, he found one of his fellow servants [Main Street taxpayers] who owed him a hundred denarii.[silver] He [banker] grabbed him [taxpayer] and began to choke him. 'Pay back what you owe me!' he demanded.
29"His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.' 30"But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt.
This parable explains exactly what is happening across the landscape of America today. The bankers will get debt forgiveness and a bailout, while struggling regular run-of-the-mill Americans will get both the shaft and bill. The bankers wrote the bankruptcy bill, the bankers made big bucks riding this housing bubble, the bankers paid each other millions and billions of dollars for shady deals with swampy swaps and demonic derivatives. It's been their big drunken money orgy and the American people have to clean-up the mess that the elephants made for 8 years, under the bigtop of life.
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