I’m Penniless, but the Laugh’s on Them

[dj3strikes]

I’m Penniless, but the Laugh’s on Them
DID you hear the one about the stockbroker who’s been sleeping like a baby? Every hour, he wakes up and cries.

That was before he read that Somali pirates were issuing a new ransom-backed security to buy Citigroup. Moody’s rated it AAA, Henry M. Paulson Jr. deemed the pirates “fundamentally sound,” and Bernard L. Madoff will safeguard the returns.

It’s not every day that hijackers, the Treasury secretary and disgraced Wall Street moguls are lumped into the same wisecrack. Then again, these aren’t ordinary times. Financial jokes that were once mainly the province of pointy-headed economists are flourishing as a popular genre, thanks to the recession and an intense longing for a national catharsis to deal with everyone’s miserable personal finances.

Late-night comedians are only the tip of the squawk box. Internet pranksters have mapped out a road trip from Detroit to Washington for the chief executives of the Big Three automakers (instructions include “Go to full-serve gas station, refill, drive away without paying bill” and “Ask government to pay for toll”). YouTubers are writing ballads about Fannie Mae, the mortgage company, and A.I.G., the much-bailed-out insurance group (the most common refrain: “Where’s my bailout?”). Even the nation of Iceland, which went bankrupt this fall, is being kicked around: someone recently put it up for auction on eBay for 50 cents.
AMERO-DOLLAR: I’m Penniless, but the Laugh’s on Them