Banking Law

It's time to answer a couple of e-mails, publicly, if semi-anonymously.

One reader, responding to my use of the phrase "TARP's a tar baby," asked me if I'd ever thought of calling it a "TARP baby." No, but Jamie Dimon beat me to the punch in any event. It figures that a guy with the golden touch of Dimon would be first to apply such a clever turn of phrase to a program that deserves all the insults bank executives can muster.

Another reader, who's a lawyer for a bank trade association, wrote to inquire about important banking issues related to a post of mine of a week ago. In that post, I'd mentioned in passing the charms of two professional female dancers, Edyta Sliwinska and Cheryl Burke. I'd also posted a picture of one of the young women, but failed to indicate which of the two was pictured. The picture was of Ms. Sliwinska.

My correspondent also made the following request:

Request that you to find some relevance that would allow you to post a picture of the other contestant into your next blog on TARP.

"Relevance"? We don't need no stinkin' "relevance" at Bank Lawyer's Blog to post a picture of Cheryl Burke. Consider the request granted on the grounds of sheer whimsy.

The same correspondent also noted that Ms. Sliwinska's costume bore a striking resemblance to costume worn many years ago by actress Barbara Eden when she portrayed a genie named Jeannie on the television show "I Dream of Jeannie" (a show co-starring the Texas fruitloop, Larry Hagman, who would later go on to fame as the dastardly J.R. Ewing in "Dallas"). He wasn't as much concerned with any of the dancers actually plagiarizing Ms. Eden's outfits as he was in having the opportunity to paste Ms. Eden's picture into an e-mail

 Always happy to oblige a fan.

Who says bank lawyers aren't a load of laughs?