The Way Live Now: Commemorating with hatred. One year ago on this day—or maybe over the weekend some time, or later this week...something—our economy collapsed, and recessionomics was born. Happy one year of suffering, for nothing!

Did you see all the crap over the last few days about, hey, what ever happened to those nice "Lehman" Brothers? The short answer is that some of them are flying private planes and some of them are running car washes and some of them are just sad, unemployed motherfuckers. And are we to cry for them? Are we to weep for these mere salespersons, cast out unto the world to suffer the weight of their own spending sprees after many, many years of making a shitload of money?

Pardon us for being unsympathetic. Pardon us for being more sympathetic to the poor god damn homeless lady who, through the worst luck in the world, lost her car, then her job, then her home, then her health, just for not having ten bucks to buy a parking sticker. Her story was the counterpoint to the Lehman story in the NYT, and they placed it all very well, so any pang of sympathy you felt for the Wall Streeters would soon be SWALLOWED UP BY RAGE when you read about this other lady, and you'd ask yourself "What have I done for America, this year?"

Have I given blood, instead of hording it all for myself? Have I done my part not to murder my fellow citizens? Have I done my part to crack down on "creative" financial shenanigans, or am I, indeed the cause of said shenanigans, because I am a "quant," and a dirty one at that?

These are all questions that each American must answer for himself as he looks back on this last year or so of financial destruction, while eating Cheetos-brand snacks. What we do know: in a nation where a grizzly bear can get swimming lessons in a pool, we believe that all things are possible. For cute, intimidating bears.