'Tis the season for ... Vampire Squids

This YouTube clip of a Goldman Sachs protest slipped by me when it appeared last month, shortly after the Lloyd Blankfein "God" comments. It comes along with this story at the Telegraph by James Quinn on the subject of Vampire Squids at Christmas.

Surely, Goldman isn't entirely responsible for the housing and credit market mess as some of the protesters allege, but there's no question about the fact that they were there the whole way making record profits.

Moreover, their close ties to the U.S. government and simply recovering faster than any other Wall Street firm - with some $20 billion in bonuses set to be handed out - makes them an easy target for those who have been less fortunate as Quinn explains

Times may be tough on Wall Street this festive season, but none as tough as at Goldman Sachs. Or at least that’s what the investment bank and its apparatchiks would appear to want us to believe.

With the beginning of Advent, so comes the trickle, trickle of well positioned stories, comments and suggestions highlighting just how Goldman-ites – or should that be Sachs-ers – are suffering at this time of year.

First came news that its bankers are not being allowed to celebrate Christmas or whatever holiday they choose to at this time of year en masse. According to Henry Blodget’s respected Business Insider website, a diktat went out last month effectively stopping those who worship at the temple of the Vampire Squid from gathering in numbers of more than 12 this yuletide.

Then came news that 300 New York workers had been encouraged to give up part of their Thanksgiving to help others less fortunate than themselves.

And finally – the piece de resistance. Word that its bankers are so afraid for their lives – or their Aston Martins – that they’re resorting to carrying guns.

To be fair, the Bloomberg comment on which such an outlandish suggestion is based does not name any names, although the writer – who is an author and former Morgan Stanley banker – does say that she has spoken to the New York Police Department, which off-the-record confirmed some of the names she gave to them (although doesn’t print) have applied for gun permits.

It's hard to see how any PR efforts can dampen the outrage over the fact that, here in 2009, the 30,000+ Goldman employees will receive average bonuses of over $500,00.

In years past, when we all thought we were getting rich, no one would have really noticed. But, now that it's clear that only Goldman is getting rich, it's an entirely different matter.