I could spend all morning thinking about this picture:
Unfortunately, I only have five minutes.
If you don't know the players: Elliot Spitzer, as New York Attorney General, prosecuted Henry Blodget, a stock analysis, for hyping stocks that Blodget personally viewed as dogs. Here they are, together again, talking about corruption on Wall Street.
Depending on how you want to frame things: Henry Blodget is a credible, new media mogul; or/and a disgraced Merrill Lynch analyst. Elliot Spizer is a revolting, overreaching, hypocritical disgraced New York Attorney General; or he is...Well, he's certainly re-creating his image. Soon he will be relevant again.
One might say it's a good thing that a person can find redemption in America. Everyone can be a Phoenix.
Blodget has been apologetic, and doesn't hide from his past. I even have a man-crush on him. Redemption might describe his situation. Spitzer has never really take responsibility for laundering money and prostitution - crimes for which he no doubt would have prosecuted others. He just took a vacation, hoping we'd forget that as New York Attorney General, he prosecuted women for breaking the same laws he broke.
We could also find the picture depressing. I do, too. In America, you not a person. You're a brand. Reality isn't real.
Reality isn't real has two sides, though. If you're a bad person, you can certainly re-create yourself. People will believe what they see. What they see is what you show them. If you're someone who cares about the truth, though, it doesn't make much sense to believe anything that anyone tells you.
