IS ERIC THERE, PLEASE?

BY JOHN KENNEYNOVEMBER 11, 2013

A tentative $13 billion settlement between JPMorgan and the Justice Department was a result of extensive personal outreach from Jamie Dimon, the bank’s chief executive, to the Justice Department.
—NYTimes.com.

Jamie Dimon: Is Eric there, please?

Receptionist: May I ask who’s calling?

Dimon: Jamie Dimon.

Receptionist: Did you say, “Jamie”?

Dimon: Yes.

Receptionist: I’m sorry, isn’t that a girl’s name?

Dimon: It can be a boy’s name, too. Is he there, please?

Receptionist: Please hold.

(A beat as Dimon is placed on hold. Music is heard—the Clash’s rendition of “I Fought the Law.” After a minute or so . . .)

Attorney General Eric Holder: This is Eric.

Dimon: Eric, it’s Jamie Dimon.

Holder: Jamie. Hey. That’s weird. My assistant said there was a girl named Jamie on the phone.

Dimon: There are a lot of guys who are named Jamie, O.K.?

Holder: Jamie Farr, from “m*a*s*h.”

Dimon: Exactly.

Holder: His character dressed like a woman, though, right?

Dimon: So listen. I think we should meet.

Holder: What, like, for dinner?

Dimon: No. For a business meeting.

Holder: Oh.

Dimon: Why? Would you ever want to have dinner?

Holder: It doesn’t have to be dinner. A walk would be nice. Maybe a coffee?

Dimon: Both sound great. Let me tell you the reason I’m calling. A few of the guys over here—the board, for example—we’re a little concerned about some . . . money stuff. Like, that maybe you guys are still thinking of, uh, bringing charges against us.

Holder: Yeah, we’re definitely planning on doing that.

Dimon: Huh. And this is something you feel strongly about?

Holder: Pretty strongly, yeah.

Dimon: I see. And you have, like, evidence and stuff?

Holder: I can’t really talk about that, but yeah . . . like, boatloads.

Dimon: Can I ask you a question?

Holder: Jamie, you know I can’t comment on anything.

Dimon: One question.

Holder: I’m listening.

Dimon: Have you ever seen “The Lion King”?

Holder: O.K., I can’t believe you’re asking me that, because I have and I loved it. And, honestly, I don’t like musical theatre as a rule.

Dimon: Right? Blew me away. When they shake that piece of fabric to make it look like it’s a river?

Holder: Julie Taymor.

Dimon: Julie Taymor.

Holder: Anyway.

Dimon: So you’re definitely suing us?

Holder: Can’t really talk about it.

Dimon: How do you like being a lawyer?

Holder: I like it. But I can’t say I love it. You know?

Dimon: Totally.

Holder: Law school was a fallback. I had no idea what I wanted to do.

Dimon: Same. No sane person becomes a banker.

Holder: Is there a lot of math in your job?

Dimon: So much. And I’m terrible at math.

Holder: I know.

Dimon: Funny. What do you call twenty-five attorneys buried up to their chins in cement?

Holder: Here it comes . . .

Holder: You guys paid back all the money we loaned you, right?Dimon: Not enough cement.

(Both laugh really hard.)

Dimon: Sure did. So listen to this. My kid brings me over to Williamsburg the other day. Have you been there?

Holder: Colonial Williamsburg? Sure. I love it. They churn their own butter.

Dimon: No, no. This is a neighborhood in Brooklyn.

Holder: Oh. No. Never heard of it.

Dimon: Listen to this. Like, every guy has a beard.

Holder: I don’t understand.

Dimon: Almost every man I saw—twenty-two to maybe forty—had a big beard, like they live in the woods or something, and I don’t know why.

Holder: Bizarre. Blankfein grew a beard. What’s up with that?

Dimon: No idea. I saw him recently. Asked him about it. He said it was symbolic, that each whisker on his face—he said he’d had a team of first-year derivatives guys count them—each whisker represented something important in his life. One might be passion, one might be love, one might be a child. He pointed to four that represented helicopters. But the bulk of his face, he said, was money. He said his entire chin was Palm Beach real estate.

Holder: Had he been drinking?

Dimon: That’s the weird thing. I don’t think so.

Holder: Lloyd.

Dimon: I feel like I understand less as I get older.

Holder: Same.

Dimon: Do you ever . . .

Holder: What?

Dimon: Do you ever . . . do you ever look out the window in the late afternoon and just get . . . sad? Like, for no reason?

Holder: Almost every day.

Dimon: I’ll walk around the office some days and just see people crying at their desks for no outward reason.

Holder: Same here.

Dimon: Total change of subject, but would you ever want to go camping?

Holder: That was weird, because you read my mind. I have a two-man tent and, like, fourteen canteens.

(Both laugh for a long time.)

Dimon: Now, in terms of a fine . . .

Holder: Yeah.

Dimon: I was talking with some of the guys here and we were thinking, like, a billion maybe would be good.

Holder: Huh.

Dimon: Were you thinking that would be a good number?

Holder: No-o-o.

Dimon: Oh. What were you thinking, hypothetically?

Holder: Hypothetically? Not less than thirteen.

Dimon: Thirteen. Wow. And that . . . that would be as in billion?

Holder: Yes, definitely billion.

Dimon: Of course. Because thirteen million . . . I mean, my pants are worth more than that . . . ha ha . . . I’m kidding, they’re not, they’re just regular pants. I just think the word “pants” is . . . Anyway. Wow. So thirteen billion.

Holder: Yeah.

(A long beat.)

Dimon: So you feel like we were . . . were bad, the guys and me, at the bank here.

Holder: Pretty much, yeah.

Dimon: Huh. That’s so weird, because we weren’t thinking that at all. We were thinking, you know, we made a lot of money and that that was, like, good.

Holder: Interesting. I guess for me it’s how you made the money?

Dimon: Not sure I understand. Why would that matter?

Holder: Well, over here it’s kind of the . . . what’s the word . . . the essence of the whole thing.

Dimon: Like . . . rules and stuff.

Holder: Exactly.

Dimon: Like that . . . what do you call it . . . Vulcan Law?

Holder: Volcker Rule.

Dimon: Yeah, that one. That’s funny, because we didn’t really take that one very seriously. We actually have a copy of it up on a wall and people kind of point at it and laugh, because, I mean, it’s just funny.

Holder: I think that’s where we differ a bit.

Dimon: Interesting. O.K., then. Well . . . I should probably talk with some of the guys.

Holder: Talk with the guys.

Dimon: Camping soon?

Holder: Can’t wait. Talk soon, Jamie. ♦

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2013/11/11/131111sh_shouts_kenney?currentPage=all