Many of Webvan's long-suffering investors were left holding shares that were not worth the paper they were printed on, as the old-timers might say.
Often, though, it's something rather less than positive, as co-workers of mothers and fathers who duck out for baseball games and orthodontist appointments complain that they're constantly left holding any bag that's still open when five o'clock rolls around.
For the British taxpayers left holding the bill, that may be some consolation.
Mr. Gaffney was left holding a budget that felt to him more like a time bomb, timed to go off in his face during next fall's campaign.
You take your perfectly healthy, happy baby to the doctor, she stabs her in the leg with a needle and you're left holding a child that screams the place down for two minutes.
All four are considered to be among the greatest players ever produced on this side of the Atlantic, and there can be few people left holding any doubts that Harrington has what it takes to join them on the pantheon.
Raising private capital by rights issues or otherwise would then become next to impossible, and the taxpayer would be left holding the baby – that is, effectively guaranteeing the bank's creditors up to the value of the preference shares.
Whoever pulled this off managed to keep the money separate from Lehman's bankruptcy filing and hence out of the reach of creditors and bondholders, who were left holding the bag when that venerable firm failed.
That will surely bring good cheer to those Harken shareholders who were left holding the stock that Mr. Bush sold, with no insider's knowledge, of course, just before it tanked.
When she writes that "New Line was left holding its dick" or that if Jay Leno "starts whining like the pussy he is, tell him to man up and shut up," she reassures everyone that Hollywood really is as ballsy as its denizens would like to believe.
