Irony – A state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result.

Whenever I meet this jester, irony, face to face, I normally get that “stranger than fiction” feeling, like I have a permanent P.O. box in the Twilight Zone. Just recently I read such an article that registered an 8.5 on the weirdness Richter scale. It would be funny if it wasn't so maddening. It would be hilarious, if it wasn't so ludicrous.

The crux of the article, you ask? Simply put, banks don't keep up with where your money has gone, neither to whom it has gone or how much. Remember the Big Do-Over that our “honorable” congressmen and representatives so hastily passed to the tune of almost $1 trillion? They first called it the bailout, then officially the Troubled Assets Relief Program, billing it as one thing and after its passage, changing the rules of the game on those who didn't want to play.

Now, they have given mind staggering billions of dollars to banks like Atlanta based SunTrust Banks Inc. ($3.5 billion) and Birmingham based Regions Financial (another $3.5 billion) both of whom are not tracking where this money is going, or has gone, or to whom it will eventually go. In the AP story by Matt Apuzzo, Barry Koling a spokesman for SunTrust said, “We're not providing dollar-in, dollar-out tracking.” Asked about the Do-Over money, Tim Deighton of Regions rejoined, “We manage our capital in its aggregate.” What is that supposed to mean, they just have one account? Answers like this with so many actions of our elected representatives reek of elitism.

How does that happen? Irony of all ironies. Ding, ding, ding! We just hit the jackpot of irony! A financial institution entrusted with safekeeping very large sums of currency who in turn loans various amounts of said money but doesn't know to whom or how much it loans, flips a switch connected to a neon light in my underdeveloped brain that flashes, “IRONY” over and over again. Does this not seem deliberately contrary to what one would expect from a bank? It does to me. With all the recent talk of oversight and slumbering administrations, I believe that this is a sure sign that the gap between the haves and have-nots is continuing to grow as the pages of the calendar turns.

I am now beginning to trust banks less than I do politicians. That says quite a bit for someone who takes great pleasure in the ease of banking technology that allows me to put my American debit card connected to a dollar based account into a Portuguese machine and instantaneously receive euros. Believe me. They know how to account for money. Suffice it to say that in this particular situation, they are simply choosing not to account for your money and my money. Well, I say – wrong answer. To Regions and SunTrust, even if I could open an account there, I certainly wouldn't do it now, nor will I recommend anyone else put their pennies there in the future.

Yours for Portugal,

Bro. Michael Andrzejewski

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