The Way We Live Now: With busted cuts. Our haircuts are busted cause we had to cut it ourselves. Our finger cuts are busted from trying to open soup cans. And the mob's cut of our stimulus cash has us...busted.

Let's get this whole haircut issue out of the way right up front. We know what you're thinking: Cutting your own hair as a recession trend story? How obvious. How has it taken this long for someone to assemble various bits of haircut-related cultural detritus into a journalism-type story on this, a classic case of home economics following macroeconomics?

What are you saying? I was home cutting my own hair because I am too broke to afford a haircut. Ha ha! All you need to know is that a rep from Big Hair tells the WSJ "[Cutting your own hair] may look easy, but it's not." Yes it is. Put a guard on your clippers and go over your head until it is all the same length. Presto, you have partaken in a trend sweeping America. (Shout out to former intern-turned-respectable reporter Mary!)

What does this have to do with soup? Here's what: Do you think that people willing to walk around with busted fades rather than pay for a barber are going to be eating anything other than soup, for sustenance? No, and Campbell's will attract all of their soup dollars, with feel-good ad campaigns and, the NYT reports, "Troy Aiken, the former Dallas Cowboys quarterback, will take part in public relations initiatives."

Heh.

It all comes back to The Mob, of course. If you thought all that economic stimulus money would flow into—for example—New York without The Mob getting its mysterious cut, you are dumber than a soup-eating hobo with a homemade haircut. The Mob is taking its cut. The only question is "How much, and where is the soup, and can I have a free haircut?"
[Pic via]