Up at Portfolio Magazine, is one of the most… um… disturbing pieces I have read in a long while. It is called Confessions of a TARP Wife.

I wish this piece was satire. I wish I had read it in the Onion, and not in a magazine that reports on the world of finance. I would have laughed.

It’s not. Basically, the wife of the CEO of a major U.S. financial company receiving funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (who has been unmasked as Liz Peek, the wife of Jeff Peek of CIT Group Inc.) is writing to “confess” to us commoners about the sacrifices she and her fellow TARP Wives are making. There are too many absurdities to list here, including how the author now flies “commercial” (surely still first class) as the company jet is off-limits, is “manically recycling or chatting with telemarketers” (how do these save money?), and holding her husband’s annual birthday bash at an upscale New York restaurant, rather than having it catered.

However, there are a few actions this TARP Wife is taking that are probably saving her great sums of money, but doing absolutely no service to her reputation:

“We now regularly turn down the invitations we receive from museums and arts organizations that will inevitably be followed by a request for funds. No point in getting their hopes up.”

Great… So while museums and arts programs see their budgets slashed, those who still have some money (exactly the group these organizations rely on to stay viable), cut charitable donations… And better yet:

“One daughter recently mused about going back to business school. I hope she didn’t notice my instantly negative reaction, stemming completely from concern about the cost.”

Because clearly, your child’s education is less important than your husband’s birthday party. I’m only glad this TARP Wife “cannot bring [herself] to shake her [daughter's] foundation”. As much as she’d like to cut out that pesky cost.

In the end, the author appeals to us to have sympathy for the financial CEOs who didn’t see the storm coming amidst the actions of the real wrongdoers such as Alan Greenspan, Fannie Mae, the rating agencies, the subprime-mortgage brokers, and investors who didn’t do their homework.

TARP Wife, I’d be willing to bet that none of them saw this coming either.