Posted on 03/17/2009 2:45:53 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
To use a current cliché, frequently deployed to humiliate bankers and CEOs: He doesn’t get it. Barack Obama, that is. He just doesn’t get it, and nor do millions of others who are following the U.S. President on his long destructive march against bankers and corporate executives for their alleged “recklessness and greed.”
Those were the words Mr. Obama used yesterday when he instructed treasury secretary, Timothy Geithner, to “pursue every legal avenue” to block the payment of $165-million in bonuses to employees of AIG Financial Products. News of the payments sparked a demagogic explosion in Congress and the U.S. media, and the President seized the momentum and then got out in front of it. He loves a parade.
There’s no need to repeat here the distorted content and hysterical tone of the AIG explosion. What is worth repeating, however, are some of the facts behind the AIG bonus payments. Much has been made of AIG CEO Edward Liddy’s letter to Mr. Geithner, explaining the reasons for the bonuses. For people who like facts with their hysteria, and can calm down enough to read it, the Liddy letter appears elsewhere on this page.
Mr. Liddy had no involvement with establishing the original bonus plan, designed to “retain” AIG Financial Product specialists through 2008 and 2009. But he says he has “grave concerns about the long-term consequences of the actions we are taking” to reduce the contractual payments to AIG employees. He warns of AIG’s inability to retain the best talent. AIG, he says, will simply not be able to attract employees if they come to believe “that their compensation is subject to continued and arbitrary adjustment by the U.S. Treasury.”
To use a current cliché, frequently deployed to humiliate bankers and CEOs: He doesn’t get it. Barack Obama, that is.
(Excerpt) Read more at network.nationalpost.com ...
Finally!
A voice of reason!
Unfortunately, the Bail out Bill he signed had a provision in it that protects those bonus payments if the promise was made before 2/09. Its a comedy of clueless clowns!
Barack gets it.
He wants hysteria against Capitalism.
had he spent Valentines day weekend READING the bill instead of flying back to chicago to take his wife to dinner he might have seen that provision in the bill.
So, where would these people be if AIG went under? Just another creditor waiting in line in hopes that the bankrupcy court will pay them. If they received a base pay, then I think they should be stuck with it and no bonus.
there should be hysteria about socialism. Its tax payers money thats going towards these bonuses. Its essentially big bonuses for government employees
under capitalism, these bonuses wouldn’t have happened, coz the company would be bankrupt
The government's role in fostering systemic risk is no excuse for embracing that risk for the sake of personal and corporate profit. Welfare cheats should not be excused because the system is vulnerable to abuse, nor should looters be set free with their booty because the municipal power company had an outage due to poor maintenance and the city did not have enough police.
Also take a look at this.
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2207793/posts
This whole thing seems planned from way back. Look at the list of sponsors. This didn’t just spring up 2 days ago ... this has been in the works a long time.
We’re being played.
Not at all a fair or a legal or a logical way to look at it.
Many of these people would have LEFT AIG, had they known that they would not get this bonus.
These “retention bonuses” are contracts written years ago.
If there had been a bankruptcy, these people would know that the bonus was NOT guaranteed. However, there was no bankruptcy -— and the employees deserve every penny!
You are not a conservative if you believe that the President or Congress can void contracts!
Besides, the President and Congress APPROVED these bonuses, by their votes and signatures!
- Republican Congress 1995 - 2006: total $1.8 trillion budget deficit.
- Democratic Congress 2007 - 2009: total $3 trillion budget deficit and growing rapidly.
AIG bonuses = hysterical non-issue to stir up the humors of the hoi polloi.
Bingo!
Wrong!
The risk was ALREADY THERE!
The RISK was in the bad mortgages, and the risk would have been there, whether or not AIG insured that risk.
This a$$clown needs to pay back the 125 large he received from aig as a bonus in 2008... the muzzie bastid!
LLS
So let them leave, and see if they can find jobs somewhere else.
If they’re going to take my money to keep themselves afloat because of exceedingly poor judgement and outright fraud, then I can determine their pay.
Otherwise, they can go BK and see what they get, along with all the other unsecured creditors.
Sadly, they could. Cronyism trumps merit.
Here’s the problem....If the Government had NOT stepped in to bail them out, then the place would have gone bankrupt and the contracts would have been renegotiated...therefore, no bonuses! (hence the reason why the the Dems did NOT want to let GM and Chrysler go bankrupt since the UAW would have had to accept negotiated contracts.)
Instead, Congress bailed them out without any conditions. THEY wrote the legislation and there were no strings attached. AIG must follow their contracts. Obama KNEW this and doesn’t care because he’ll let them take the heat. Even the NY TImes mentioned that Obama KNEW the bonuses were going to given out, so to feign outrage is his typical (and lying) response.
There was NO “outright fraud” -—
You do not like what happened?
So what?
Your personal likes and dislikes don’t count.
Your emotions, like ALL emotions, are a very poor basis for law or contracts or decisions.
Respect the law.
Respect contracts.
Respect the division of powers and the limits on government.
Or, you are a LIBERAL -— or maybe even worse!
Yes, bankruptcy was an option PRIOR to the government coming in to this situation. However, it is unfair for the government to change the rules NOW, after these employees were told that their contracts, their compensation, was SAFE!
They could have left long ago, but held on, because of the INCENTIVE to stay!
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