Shut Up, Bankers

Yesterday I wrote that Obama could do a better job explaining the necessity of our banking system so that populists would keep their tea parties inside. That was before I read Gabriel Sherman's remarkable New York piece chronicling the earth-shattering moans of the New York's banking elite. It's almost enough to make you think: Who needs these guys, anyway? In a word, it's jaw-dropping. In a sentence, it reeks of a snobby disconnect from reality and a hyperelitism that makes "The Hills" cast look like the orphans from "Annie." Choice quotes after the jump:

"No offense to Middle America, but if someone went to Columbia or Wharton, [even if] their company is a fumbling, mismanaged bank, why should they all of a sudden be paid the same as the guy down the block who delivers restaurant supplies for Sysco out of a huge, shiny truck?" e-mails an irate Citigroup executive to a colleague.

"I'm not giving to charity this year!" one hedge-fund analyst shouts into the phone, when I ask about Obama's planned tax increases. "When people ask me for money, I tell them, 'If you want me to give you money, send a letter to my senator asking for my taxes to be lowered.' I feel so much less generous right now. If I have to adopt twenty poor families, I want a thank-you note and an update on their lives. At least Sally Struthers gives you an update."

Last, and also least, in so many ways:

"The government wants me to be a slave!" says one hedge-fund analyst