Larry PostApocalyptic Fink $41.9 million in 2007. David FLOCK Tepper $4 billion in OF Phil 2009. VULTURES Falcone $825 million When the carnage in 2009. it wasn’t actually the Apocalypse. But the near collapse of the one wanted ever to see again. The first step to prevent a recurrence began, they world financial system in the fall of 2008 was biblical. Institutions was simply to banish those who had a role in causing the crisis swooped down to reap were felled. Expectations were defied. Leaders were exposed as (unless they were needed to help unravel the complex problems their rewards. charlatans, megalomaniacs, or incompetents. Trusted figures like they helped create). But who would replace them? For now, it seems, Alan Greenspan, whose wisdom was thought to be infallible, were power has gone to those who grabbed it. For those of us sitting on revealed, like the Wizard of Oz, to be mere little old men. The the sidelines, the gaudy spectacle of this upheaval has been both George Soros haunting sight of the most powerful people in the world staring into horrifying and strangely entertaining, like watching a dystopian $3.3 billion in the abyss and asking, “What do we do now?” was something that no fantasy directed by Mel Brooks. Too bad it’s, you know, real. 2009. John Paulson $2.3 billion in 2009. JPMorgan Steve Eisman Chase $100 million+ Jamie swallowed Bloated Beasts in 2008. Dimon Radioactive Washington Now they’re Tim Mutual, Bear really too big to fail. Geithner Stearns. Geithner was once highly Michael respected, but that Burry changed when $100 million in he became Treasury swallowed 2007. Lynch. secretary. Now: The president makes jokes about people pissing Vikram Pandit’s on him (“The last thing Tim Zombie Bank Geithner needs is Wells Fargo After paring down its someone else treating him like a fire hydrant”). swallowed balance sheet, ailing financial Wachovia. supermarket He can’t sell his house. has a little more color in its cheeks. But it No one believes he never still has $480 billion in worked for . toxic assets … And he’s dogged by rumors he is about to be replaced by , Michael Bloomberg, or anyone who shows the faintest interest in the position.

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