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Will Rogers calls bankers ‘the most disgustingly rich audience I’ve ever talked to’
06.03.2014
07:42 pm
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For the longest time my impression of Will Rogers was that he was just a Hollywood cowboy, but the actor and vaudevillian was also a cutting political satirist, arguably in the league of Mark Twain. He was a staunchly liberal populist—anti-war, anti-big business, anti-poverty, and he abhorred the two-party system. Lines like “a fool and his money are soon elected,” and “I belong to no organized party, I’m a Democrat,” gave him an air of relatable cynicism—think of a Jon Stewart with more middle American appeal. Rogers’ humor also laid the groundwork for Stephen Colbert’s cartoonish right-wing ideologue shtick. He even ran a mock presidential campaign in 1928, over 80 years before Colbert’s, on the fictional Anti-Bunk Party ticket.

His healthy habit of self-deprecation usually kept him in the good graces of the folks he mocked, but it’s hard to believe the speech below, from either 1923 or 1924, didn’t piss off a few oligarchs. After making some bad investments in an attempt to produce his own films, Rogers took on a bunch of corporate speaking gigs to pay off his debts—he was considered the most successful “after-dinner speakers” of his time. The performance you hear is actually the studio recording of a talk he gave live, most likely to a conference for the American Bankers Association in 1922.

It’s not likely that Rogers felt conflicted mocking capitalists and taking their money, but he also made no bones about the moral righteousness of paid funny-men, saying in 1923, “banking and after-dinner speaking are two of the most non-essential industries we have in this country. I am ready to reform if they are.”

The transcript is below, but it’s really worth listening to for Rogers’ comic timing and oratory bravado

Loan sharks and interest hounds: I have addressed every form of organized graft in the United States, excepting Congress. So it’s naturally a pleasure to me to appear before the biggest. You are without a doubt the most disgustingly rich audience I’ve ever talked to, with the possible exception of the Bootleggers’ Union Local No. 1, combined with the enforcement officers.

Now I understand you hold this convention every year to announce what the annual gyp will be. I have often wondered where the depositors hold their convention. I had an account in a bank once and the banker asked me to withdraw it. Said I used up more red ink than the account was worth.

I see where your wives come with you. You notice I say “come” not “was brought.” I see where your convention was opened with a prayer. You had to send outside your ranks to get somebody who knew how to pray. You should have had one creditor there. He’d have shown you how to pray. I noticed in the prayer the clergymen announced to the almighty that the bankers were here. Well, it wasn’t exactly an announcement. It was more in the nature of a warning. He didn’t tell the devil, he figured he knew where you all were all the time anyhow.

I see by your speeches that you are very optimistic of the business conditions of the coming year. Boy, I don’t blame you. If I had your dough, I’d be optimistic too.

Will you please tell me what you all do with the vice-presidents the bank has? I guess that’s to get anybody more discouraged before you can see the main guy. The United States is the biggest business institution in the world. They only got one vice-president. Nobody’s ever found anything for him to do!

I’ve met most of you as I come out of the stage door of the Follies every night. I want to tell you, any of you that are capitalized at under a million dollars needn’t hang around there! Our girls may not know their Latin and Greek, but they certainly know their Dun and Bradstreet.

You have a wonderful organization. I understand you have 10,000 here, and with what you have in various federal prisons, your membership is around 30,000.

So goodbye, paupers! You are the finest bunch of Shylocks that ever foreclosed a mortgage on a widow’s home.

 

 
Via The Public Domain Review

Posted by Amber Frost
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06.03.2014
07:42 pm
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