Wall Street

September 29 2008, 4:30-5:00 PM EST

I was sitting at my friend’s house watching TV when it became clear that the bailout wasn’t gonna go through and no one seemed to have any idea what that meant or what would happen. So since it was, according to everybody on TV, a bailout for Wall Street and I happen to be in New York now, I decided to head down to the financial district and check out the scene. As it turns out, the scene was weird. There were camera crews everywhere of course and, accordingly, there were also lots of zealots representing various ideologies (socialism, conservative Islam, free market fundamentalism, etc.) shouting I-told-you-so’s to anyone who’d listen. The traders were post-traumatic/pre-alcoholic. And on top of it, there were scores of mostly European tourists who were taking the whole scene in with a sort of giddy glibness. Here’s a few shots from the trip.