Not Exactly Leading by Example; "Let Them Eat Cake" Edition

After flying his wife, children and two nannies with him on a private jet to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, billionaire Jeff Greene reportedly said during an interview, “America’s lifestyle expectations are far too high and need to be adjusted so we have less things and a smaller, better existence. We need to reinvent our whole system of life.”

He, of course, doesn't mean himself, nosiree.

Greene owns a $195-million mansion in Beverly Hills with 23 bathrooms, a Turkish spa, rotating dance floor, a 50-seat theater, and a vineyard. He also owns two other mansions in Los Angeles, one in Palm Beach, one in the Hamptons, and a 145-foot party yacht.

After all, wouldn't it be asking too much of Mr. Greene to get by with only two opulent mansions in Los Angeles?

One of the fattest of fat cats, a guy who made his money by wrecking the economy in 2008* has a lot of gall to preach to Americans that we have to tighten up out lifestyles. He tried to buy himself a Senate seat and failed, bigtime.

Greene and his ilk love to sit in their mansions, drink champagne on their yachts and buzz around in their jets, all the while decrying those who advocate for paying workers living wages, not merely wages that put them on food stamps and hoping that the local church-run food pantry's shelves aren't bare this week. They engineer the tax codes to make taxes regressive and to exempt themselves from taxation.**

But don't think about sharpening up your pitchforks, making torches and warming up the tar. The world's oligarchs are buying up chunks of New Zealand so they have places to flee to.
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* Earning the nickname "the Meltdown Mogul".
** Leona Helsmley's mistake was being small-minded: she cheated directly on her taxes, instead of paying off congressmen to rewrite the tax code.

(H/T)