La morte del Vecchio

Wu Ming 1 (pdf) in his own "postilla" to the New Italian Epic, writes about the presence (or absence) of "Il Vecchio" in NIE writings. This is connected to a sense that all of those who created society are now fading away, and are either irreplaceable or are merely not being replaced. But the greatness that is oftentimes appropriated to "Il Vecchio", virtually anywhere in the world, doesn't necessarily take account of the situation.

These lions of the world, and one could throw out many names here, were certainly pioneers. Pioneers in America have the good reputation of putting it all on the line, it being their lives in all senses of the word, and they are praised for being able to succeed despite myriad obstacles. But in reality, what faced them was much simpler than what faces us today, and if we lack our own heroes, it may only be because the situation that we find ourselves in is, thanks to those Vecchi, infinitely more complicated.

The beauty of fighting nature, nothingness, even Indians, was that the enemy was known and generally static. The environment that faced pioneers heading west didn't change as their tactics changed; they were able to learn and react, and ultimately overcome. It certainly wasn't easy; but nor was it a continuously changing situation.

Instead today we find ourselves within a system, going up against an environment, that is never static; where every move that is made to advance a position is met with a counter-move, eventually spiraling into the abyss of a seemingly futile game. These games are not, of course, futile; but they do require different methods than those that were available to the Vecchi. It is much harder to change a system than it is to begin one. The people who are able to do so should be lauded. If only we can find them.

Moments of Truth

Today's congressional hearings were mostly an exercise in futility. The questions and answers, like much of political theater (which isn't terribly different than any other type of theater, be it found on Broadway, on a stage set up at the local middle school's gym, or on the streets of Madrid) were already known to participants and onlookers alike. What was instead being sought after was that moment of truth, where the irony allows us a glimpse inside of its iron curtain.

The irony that I am referring to should be briefly clarified. Because the questions and answers were not referring to anything outside of the hearing room, they must be seen as existing only in relation to themselves. The room formed a closed system, in which the various words and phrases only referred back to other words and phrases uttered in that room, on this day. This is irony, not in its popularized, Alanis Morissette-branded unlucky sense, but in its true sense of a self-referential universe that continually turns back on itself without ever encouraging any wider comprehension.

But there was one instant that let the light, as it were, shine through: and, it provides us with the winners and losers of the day. David Viniar, Goldman's CFO, let slip a single phrase that showed exactly what the financial collapse, and these hearings, are; if we had any sense moving forward (and I always use "we" when referring to the government, because it is not outside of us, it is not out of our control, and those who take on an "us v them" attitude with it have already given up all hope), we should take this one sentence and make the reforms based upon it only; it is exactly what the financial industry thinks.

Referring to Goldman emails in which securities that were being sold by the company were said to be "shitty", the NYT relates the exchange thusly:

He asks Mr. Viniar what he felt when he heard about the things Goldman employees had written about these deals, again using vulgar words.

Mr. Vin[i]ar replies, “I think that’s very unfortunate to have on e-mail.”

And there you have it: the one moment of clarity from the entire day, from the entire year, and from the entire past two decades of the financial world. The rest is mere irony, yet that sentence is the truth. It is a sad one, sure, but no one ever sad that the situation wasn't sad, and not merely because some people, this time, lost money, lost jobs, lost lives (literally and figuratively).

In the end, it is far better to teach ourselves and our children to recognize those moments for what they are, the only ones that actually matter, rather than asking them to understand the vicissitudes of the markets or the concepts behind bundled derivatives. Language used skillfully can do wonderful and terrible things; it can dissimulate problems to the point of explosion and it can create fantasy worlds that point us to a way out of our current state of affairs. But it can also betray us, as it did with Mr. Viniar here, or deliver us, as his slip was our gain. And if we fail to act on that truth gained through language, it is our fault, for not recognizing it or, perhaps, for not wanting any part of it.