When is the Right Time to Debate?

Certainly, now when we are in the midst of an emergency with reactors in Japan melting down, it is not the time to debate nuclear power safety -- so say the Republicans.

When is the right time?

Is it far enough away from 9-11 in time that we can talk about sensible safety on airlines instead of this hodge-podge of ridiculous steps we talk now that doesn't make anyone feel safer?

Has enough time passed from when the miners were lost at a mine in West Virginia that had repeated and egregious safety violations for years for us to have the conversation about mine safety and regulation?

How about wet land restoration and effective dike building? Has enough time passed since Katrina that we can begin to debate this?

Obviously it's never the right time to have a debate about gun safety, no matter how many public officials or public safety officers get killed!

It's been months since BP created a huge dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico -- can we talk about drilling safety now?

It's been several years since Lehman was closed but now Basel III is recommending minimum capital level below what Lehman had at the time of their failure -- can we talk about that now or is it still too close to the banking bailout?

How many states have to experience their water table being poisoned by fracking techniques before we can debate safety of gas extraction procedures?

How come it's not the right time to debate nuclear reactor safety but it is the right time to reduce funding for tsunami warnings?

Idiots!

How Do These Idiots Get on TV to Pontificate??

Former GE CEO and Chairman Jack Welch was on Morning Joe this morning demonstrating that he is senile.

He was asked by Joe whether it was a problem that Americans don't manufacture things anymore and that the Chinese are the big manufacturers now. Welch, who oversaw a lot of this off-shoring manufacturing during his rein as master of the Universe, said some stunningly stupid things. He claimed that the Chinese only manufacture small things where we have retained the manufacturing of important things like the iPad. One of the other "experts" on Joe's panel asked "what about high speed rail?" Welsh said that isn't the Chinese, he claims the high speed rail is in Japan. Yes, Japan has had high speed rail for year but unless you are under a rock everyone should know China has just leapfrogged over everyone with their high speed rail -- faster, safer, longer, freigh handling -- and Jack doesn't know?! China builds 1200 miles of high speed rail and has it operational this year and Welch denies it's occurring! He thinks we make the iPad?!! Is South Korea part of the USA now? Because Samsung, the manufacturer of the iPad is in South Korea. Only small things, huh? I guess Jack considers the GE wind turbines "small things" made in China. They are 80 meters high and made in Shenyang, China! It takes at least 6 HUGE flat bed tractor trailer trucks to move one of them from the port where we import them to the Columbia Gorge where they are being installed. GE's Global Research Center is in Shanghai and Jack Welsh doesn't know??!!

Idiots! Scarborough should do just a little sanity test on proposed guests before booking them on his show. At a minimum they should be up on current events in their own freekin' industry!

Deja Vu All Over Again

BP's insistence that the air is safe to breathe and workers don't need protection seems to be a repeat of the Administration assuring us that the air at the World Trade Center was safe after 9-11. The only difference seems to be that it took longer for the symptoms to show up on the 9-11 workers than it is for the workers on the oil gush cleanup.

When are we ever going to choose to be more concerned about the safety of people over corporate profits?

Conservatives Divide

Andrew Sullivan tore into Peggy Noonan this morning. How come a conservative musters more passion supporting Obama than Democrats?

Here's some of his best quips:

. . . It heralds nothing less than the end of the Obama presidency just a year and a half in:

The disaster in the Gulf may well spell the political end of the president and his administration ...

Seriously? Her evidence for this? She claims the Democrats don't love him. The latest poll of polls shows over 80 percent support. She claims that he is "weakened, polarizing and lacking broad public support." Really? With unemployment at near record highs after a deep recession, Obama's approval ratings are stuck just below 50 percent - and have been remarkably stable for months. At this point in his presidency, Obama is about five points more popular than Reagan, who was poised to drop to 37 percent approval by January of 1983. Clinton was lower than Obama in June 1994. In today's polarized climate and awful economy, Obama is remarkably resilient. He has a favorable rating over 52 percent, and his unfavorable rating is at a six month low of 39 percent. This is Obama's political end?

The premise of Noonan's moronic column is that the federal government, especially the president, should be capable of ending an oil-pipe rupture owned and operated by private companies, using technology that only deep-sea oil companies deploy or understand. And if such a technical issue is not resolved by government immediately, it reveals paralyzing presidential weakness and the failure of an entire branch of political philosophy. Again: seriously? It's Obama's fault that under Bush and Cheney, government regulation of oil exploration was so poor and corrupt, corner cutting appears to have been routine? And this, Peggy, is what governments do, even when run by crazy-ass liberals. Governments do not dig for oil; they merely regulate those who dig for oil. That the government failed to do so under the previous administration does not seem to me to be proof that this administration has failed.

What I have also learned these past few years is that the right seeks merely a narrative to lead themselves out of the hole they dug for all of us. Reality be damned. The job of the rest of us is to insist that reality matters and that these fools be exposed.

Come on, Democrats! Let's show a little support and passion. We are in the majority, for GAWDS sake!

Thursday's Stock Market Dive

Thursday the stock market nose dived almost 1000 points in 15 minutes. The NY Times says

President Obama and lawmakers called for action, and regulators at agencies including the Securities and Exchange Commission promised to deliver, even as they struggled to understand the origins and particulars of Thursday’s chaos.

The gist of the solution, according to regulators, traders and academics is that markets need uniform rules for intervening when a stock goes into free fall.

I've heard excuses that it was "fat finger syndrome", the Greek riots, computerized trading, but what I never hear about is computer hacking.

As Amy Poehler said on Saturday Night Live Last Night: "You mean a trader can trade a billion shares without manager oversight, while if I try to use a $50 bill to pay for a Starbucks it becomes a 4 person transaction -- REALLY?"

My hope is that SOMEONE is investigating whether this was due to hacking but they just aren't talking about it until they can set up safeguards to prevent it from happening again.

Sometimes I am a Pollyanna and live in my own happy safe world.

The Ridiculousness of the Bail Out

When you get Digby over at Hullabaloo adding to quotes from Atrios at Eschaton, you know there should be a warning sign:

It's a little weird that reporters are hesitant to clearly spell out what happened. Basically the Fed printed a huge amount of money. Some of that money they used to do what TARP was originally supposed to do, buy up Big Shitpile at inflated prices. Some of that money they lent to banks at basically 0 interest. Of course there were plenty of other things they could have done with 2 trillion bucks, if preserving the executive compensation at megabanks wasn't thought to be crucial for the survival of the economy. They could have dropped it from helicopters. They could have paid off mortgages directly. They could have given it to state governments. They could have bought me a SUPERTRAIN. But, no, they decided that propping up an obviously failed system of financial intermediaries was the important thing, so that's what they did.

The ruling elites believed that the best way to bring back the economy was to ensure that jackasses like Fabrice Tourre weren't unduly inconvenienced, the thought being that even though they were the ones who caused the problems, we couldn't possibly do without them. And we the proletariat are supposed to be so grateful that they left Ponzi in place to further steal from us in the future. This was the problem with leaving Geithner, Bernanke, and Summers on the payroll and keep bringing Greenspan back to testify and guide the idiots.

I agree with Digby and Atrios that we could have spent that money smarter and in a way that it would have resulted in a lasting legacy of infrastructure for generation to come. But NO we had to ensure that the Fabulous Fabrice got his bonus.

WA State Republithugs Find Their Senate Candidate

The Republithugs have found their candidate to face Patty Murray: Superbowl hero Washington Redskin Clint Didier. He has a website for donations with the requisite waving flag and Reagan quote and states:

I am not a practiced politician. I am commited to representing you "the people" to the best of my ability. A team effort will be required to bring our Government back to its original definition under the Constitution.

Interesting since in his interviews and speaches his trademark issue is that we should abolish the separation of Church and State. I guess his Constitution that he always carries around with him is missing a page or two.

Democrats Roll in the Pork Mud

When President Obama urged Congress earlier this year to cancel a series of major weapons programs deemed no longer needed, he specifically cited the effort to build a backup engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The Obama administration has signaled for months that funding for a second F-35 engine in the fiscal 2010 defense bill could become veto bait. Gates spent months, most recently at the beginning of September, making the case that the Pentagon does not need or want the alternative engine.

But the smell of pork was too irresistible for John Kerry.

But while Congress was ultimately persuaded to adopt most of Obama’s proposed weapons cuts - including canceling the F-22 fighter program - the GE program was rescued with the aid of several Massachusetts lawmakers who lobbied behind the scenes. It marked the fourth year in a row that Bay State lawmakers joined other lawmakers with GE jobs in their states to save the project from the Pentagon’s budget ax.

Senator John F. Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, said that GE officials had told his office that 1,000 jobs in Massachusetts will be saved or maintained once full production begins on the backup engine.

Crooks & Liars says it best:

What utter bullshit. This is just unjustified crap, and it doesn't smell any better coming from a Democratic politician than a Republican. In talking about defense acquisition with a colleague, he said that he might believe in Santa Claus, but he didn't believe in acquisition reform. With clowns like this in the Senate and White House, it's no wonder that the Defense Department can't get clear of its huge funding bills and massively overpriced, behind schedule programs.

This is what causes the public not trust ANY politician. Shame on John Kerry.

Kill Lieberman's Bill

We Democrats stand on the verge of ushering in a world of nearly unregulated mandates, in which we're all forced by the state to hand over our money to failed private monopolies, with no cost control in return. Without a public option and no hope of expanding Medicare coverage, this bill is not worth supporting.

Please encourage your Senators to vote against the Lieberman insurance company welfare act.

We'll have to live another day to try to correct the injustice, waste, inefficiency, and unfairness of our current health care system. Nine months wasted. What a shame.

Legalized Cookin' the Books

While we're all focused on health care and spree shootings, bankers are quietly trying to sneak a new law in that would legalize falsifying financial statements.

We've been waiting for regulatory reform of the financial services industry and what we're getting instead is a permission for banks to use smoke and mirrors. Banks are trying to get Congress to agree that the next time there's a big downturn, they should have the ability to alter their accounting standards -- essentially, fudge the numbers -- so that the public and investors won't be able to tell how insolvent they really are. By ignoring their declining asset values, they can avoid the standard requirement of raising more capital. This is a Democrat sponsored bill. Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., wants to amend the Financial Stability Improvement Act of 2009. Perlmutter’s proposal would hand over responsibility for overseeing accounting standards to the agencies being contemplated to oversee systemic risk, which could allow most companies to never comply with the law, and if that doesn't do enough harm it would also mandate a study to see whether it would be a good idea to exempt additional ones as well.

Sarbanes-Oxley was passed, almost unanimously, by a Republican-controlled House and a Democratic-controlled Senate. Now a Democratic Congress is gutting it with the apparent approval of the Obama administration. Wednesday they passed an amendment that exempt small and mid-size companies from audits required under the Sarbanes-Oxley corporate-reform law. Now they start sidsussing whether to extend these powers to the financial services. I don't understand why we're even considering this.

The American Bankers Association is now pushing Congress to give a new systemic risk regulator — either the Federal Reserve or some panel of regulators — the power to override accounting standards. The view of the bankers is that the financial crisis did not stem from the fact that the banks made lots of bad loans and invested in dubious securities; it was caused by accounting rules that required disclosure when the losses began to mount.

I can't believe I'm on the same side of an issue as the Chamber of Commerce but bad laws make strange bedfellows.

Of course the Chamber is looking at it in terms of investors but my point of view is that of a regulator. People think regulators have all the power and we can close financial institutions on a whim. Not so, generally we watch financial institutions that we know are not survivable limp along and waste away until they at last become insolvent and we can grab control. But by then it's too late to save anything so we end up liquidating It would really save money if we could conserve earlier rather than waiting until they are a corpse or zombie. If this new bill passes, it could become impossible to recognize an insolvent financial institution.

Braney Frank hasn't weighed in yet. I hope he comes with some common sense.

Hoffman is Thrown Under the Bus

Big surprise! Hoffman lost in NY-23. (snark, snark)

A week ago Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman met with the editorial board of the Watertown Daily Times, the largest paper in the district. After Hoffman “showed no grasp of the bread-and-butter issues pertinent to district residents,” his companion in the meeting, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey, rose to his defense by dismissing regional concerns as “parochial” issues that would not determine the outcome of the election.

Today the story is different. Politico reports on a conference call Wednesday with reporters to discuss the 2009 election results, Dannenfelser, Campaign for Working Families PAC President Gary Bauer and National Organization for Marriage Executive Director Brian Brown largely avoided analyzing the New York special election and focused on GOP victories in the New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races. They report Dick Armey had some thoughts:

Armey, the former House GOP majority leader, noted that Democrats had seized on Hoffman’s inability to address local concerns.

“The fact of the matter is, he didn’t pay enough attention to the local concerns, and they were able to tag him as being unaware of the local needs and concerns,” Armey said.

I expect my Congressman to be aware and an advocate for my local issues first and foremost. But the tea-baggers have a litmus test that their candidates must only subscribe and follow the Glen Beck 9.12. And if you don't win after all their money, talent, and celebrity then there's something wrong with you.

Luckily NY-23 saw how they were trying to use them and looked out for their interests first.

Money Honey Dumb as a Stump

I've always considered Maria Bartiromo a pretty version of a get-rich-quick huckster with just a better time slot on TV than the other infomercials. She cares about one thing and one thing only -- the stock market. It's good news to her when people get laid off because stock will go up. It's great news if they off shore jobs because stock prices will go up. She sucks up to corporations and fawns over CEO's and lets them lie and do puff pieces on her "Closing Bell" show even just days before their companies implode or charges are filed on the CEO's -- who can forget her relationship with Todd Thompson of Citigroup, interview on Lehman Brothers last year, Ken Lewis on how their acquisition of Countrywide was a good thing, or with John Sauro of North American Mortgage. I always assumed that if people are smart enough to play in the stock market that they should be smart enough to see through her "Money Honey" persona.

But somehow last year Bartiromo started thinking she was a real commentator -- WOW! SHE IS DUMB!! Last year, conveniently just before the election in late September, Bartiromo hosted a special on the "Hunt for Black Gold" -- featuring Sarah Palin with her "drill, baby, drill" strategy. Bartiromo never challenged her -- it was definitely a puff Republican support piece. She has lied about Obama almost incessantly since -- he promised no earmarks, wants to tax small businesses, Obama gave AIG the bailout. But since then, she's been out and about more -- I don't care about "The View" pieces and some of the other soft stuff. But she pretends to be a serious commentator and she obviously doesn't have a clue. Last month it was the goof about Medicare on the Carlos Watsons' show:

At one point, Bartiromo was critical of the government-managed health care system in the United Kingdom. "How do I know the quality [of health care in the United States] is not going to suffer" with a public option? she asked.

Rep. Weiner reminded her that there already is government-managed health care in the United States -- namely, Medicare, the system created for Americans 65 years and older -- and that patients with Medicare report very high satisfaction rates.

Bartiromo's response to this argument was a true head-scratcher. In a mocking tone, she pressed the congressman: "How come you don't use it [Medicare]? You don't have it. How come you don't have it?"

Rep. Anthony Weiner, who turns 45 this week, tried to walk Bartiromo through it. "Because I'm not 65." But she was insistent. "Yeah... c'mon!" she exclaimed, laughing incredulously.

But before that she kept repeating that Health Care Reform was going to cost us over a trillion dollars over 10 years. I chucked both of these statements to her blind allegiance to supporting the stock value of her health care provider corporations.

This morning, she branched out to other topics, with equal idiocy. Tim Dickinson from Rolling Stone was on Morning Joe to talk about his newest article called The Lie Machine on who is behind the birthers, deathers, tea baggers. Bartiromo was on the panel and her "salient" point was that Democrats do it too. She thought she really got Tim when she accused "Who's behind "Move On"?!" WOW! Read much, Maria??

It was a really eye rolling moment. She should be required to do just a little research before she's allowed to open her mouth on her own without a script.

Repercussions

Steve Brill (founder of CourtTV) used to publish a magazine called "Brill's Content". It was a pretty decent magazine but went bust in 2001. Each month the magazine published a running score of pundunt accuracy. The scores were dismal!

The smart and funny Bill in Portland Maine had a great post today on penalties. He listed off common penalties for sports, traffic citations, fines, etc. He then cited this penalty:

Neocon Republicanism: Lying about and/or being completely wrong and/or incompetent and/or deceitful about WMDs, torture, terror threats and civil liberties between 2001 and 2009 = Book deals, TV appearances, regular guest columns in major newspapers and magazines, huge speaking fees, credibility and authority inside the D.C. beltway, invitations to cocktail parties, lobbying power, Twitter/Facebook stardom, and serving as "balance" on talk shows against those who didn’t lie and were completely right and competent and candid about WMDs, torture, terror threats and civil liberties between 2001 and 2009.

How true!!

Health Care Insurers Chutzpah or Confidence?

Last week I wrote to my Senators and Congressman:

The House and Senate needs to quit carrying the insurance industry water on their trigger proposal and other delaying techniques. Congress needs to represent the people. We, the people, want universal single payer health care. We're willing to discuss public 'option' just so long as it does not become the insurance companies' dumping ground for so called "uninsurable" high risk/high cost patients and allow the insurance companies to cherry pick the least risk patients. The public option must be a real option for people and be operated in such a way that it stays competitive with private for-profit companies.

Senator Reid and Congresswoman Pelosi are not demonstrating adequate leadership in this area. They appear to be beholding to the insurance companies and are ignoring the electorate. Universal health care is this generation's watershed issue. Please get on board and support real health care reform. Just kicking this issue down the road and trusting that for-profit companies will cut costs is unacceptable. The trigger options are unacceptable. We all remember how the problems with the prescription drug legislation were going to be fixed later and here years and years later we still have that donut hole in coverage and no negotiating for prices. This time we need real reform -- not a flawed half way measure and another empty promise of fixing it later.

Any legislator that compromises on this opportunity to reform health care will have to answer for this when they come up for re-election. This is not an issue that can be swept under the rug. You will be held accountable for your vote and leadership on this issue.

Years ago fire departments were all privately owned and for profit. We, the people, saw that there was a public interest to bring them into the public sphere and out of private hands. I'm sure the fire companies of their day stalled, whined, and threatened their public officials so they could hold onto their power and profit. But the public need was more important and today fire departments are publicly financed and managed. We are now at another watershed time in history. Basic universal health care is too important to be left to private for-profit companies. It is a public need and the public needs to finance and manage it.

Please support universal single-payer health care reform. Stand up for the people, not private for-profit interests.

This week they heard directly from our friendly health insurance companies.

Top executives of UnitedHealth's Golden Rule Insurance Co., Assurant Health and WellPoint Inc., appearing Tuesday before the the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, told angry lawmakers they would not confine such rescissions to cases in which intentional fraud on the part of the policyholder can be shown, the Los Angeles Times reported Wednesday.

I wonder if our Congress people are capable of connecting the dots. We need to get rid of these vampires who have been sucking insurance premiums from us and then when faced with maybe paying out something, recission us, canceling health insurance policies retroactively. Heads they win, tails we loose. Even faced with the (remote) possibility of a single-payer universal health care, these vampires refuse to change their practice of recission.

I'd say they had chutzpah but they are instead probably confident that they've bought the house and senate and have nothing to worry about.


UPDATE 6-17 PM -- Here's the response I got from Sen Murray:

. . . Recently, I joined with my colleagues on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, of which I am a senior member, to introduce the "Affordable Healthy Choices Act." This legislation reduces health care costs, allows Americans to keep the coverage they have if they want it, and makes health insurance affordable to those who do not have it today.

I am particularly proud that as we work to offer quality, affordable coverage to all Americans, that we have included provisions to support programs that would increase the number of Americans going into health care professions to ensure our system has enough workers to provide much needed care. . .

What does that mean?

Is Hillary Kidding?

Hillary posted a message on the State Department website commemorating the 20th anniversary of Tiananmen Square.

She states in part:

China . . . to take its rightful place in global leadership, should examine openly the darker events of its past and provide a public accounting of those killed, detained or missing, both to learn and to heal.

How can she even suggest this while at the same time playing the party line of "we're not looking back" when it comes to investigating our use of torture and warrant less searches?

Hypocrite.

We'll Never Be Accused of Being a Greatest Generation

From 1942 to 1946 more than 400,000 German, Italian and Austrian Nazi prisoners were housed in over five hundred major camps and several satellite camps in many U.S. states, including Ohio, California, Mississippi, Arkansas, Oregon, Georgia, Texas and Nebraska. 150,000 prisoners came after the Allies captured the complete Afrika Korps in 1943. Another huge influx of prisoners came after D-Day in 1944, through December of that year, when 30,000 POWs arrived monthly. Laurie McLaughlin has a brief article on this at Suite 101. The History Channel covered this. There are several books on Nazi POWs in America.

400,000!! So why are FBI Director Robert Mueller and 90 Senators, including Cantwell and Murray, such wimps over 240 detainees at Gitmo?

How can we somehow manage to hold hardened criminals, serial killers, terrorists like Charlie Manson, David Berkowitz, Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, Richard Speck, Aileen Wuornos, the Blind Sheik and so on . . . but somehow we are incapable to hold on American soil Osama's driver??

The Senate needs to grow a set and grow up.

Another Good Pitchfork Post

From the smart and beautiful Digby, of course:

People are being asked to make all kinds of concessions these days. They are being asked to cut back hours and pay and forego raises and benefits. They are taking on extra work because the companies aren't replacing employees who leave. Reports of mistreatment in the workplace are way up. They are trapped in jobs they hate, with houses they can't afford, desperately afraid to get sick because if they lose their jobs they lose their health care. And yet highly paid executives are insisting that they are entitled to huge sums of money.

This attitude of entitlement is what's infuriating average citizens and legitimately so. These people are supposed to be masterful leaders and they are instead acting like pampered Chinese princes cloistered from the rest of the world behind the darkened windows of their limousines and the walls of their gated communities. They honestly don'[t understand just how angry people are at this display of arrogance and aristocratic privilege. It's astonishing.

Amen

Another Extortion Attempt

Via Commercialappeal.com:

FedEx could cancel contracts for $6.7 billion in American-made planes if Congress makes it easier for unions to organize the delivery giant's workers.

In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Friday, the Memphis-based delivery company disclosed that future commitments to buy Boeing 777s are contingent on FedEx Express' continued coverage by the Railway Labor Act.

The disclosure serves as a warning to lawmakers seeking to put FedEx Express workers under the National Labor Relations Act, a move seen as helping the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and rival UPS.

The Seattle Times calls it this way:

FedEx said it may not buy 30 more Boeing 777 freighters if a federal law is changed to make it easier for its employees to join a union.

Following through on those orders and options, with a list price of $7.7 billion, depends on FedEx employees continuing to be under the Railway Labor Act, the company said.

That law, which covers FedEx workers because the company was founded as an airline, requires a national vote if employees want union representation.

Legislation approved by a U.S. House panel March 5 would make it easier for drivers of Memphis, Tenn.-based FedEx to vote locally to join unions, by placing the company under the National Labor Relations Act.

FedEx's larger rival, United Parcel Service, backs the proposed change, saying it would even the playing field. About half of UPS' employees belong to the Teamsters union, while FedEx's only unionized group is its pilots.

The Teamsters have been trying to win representation of FedEx drivers for years.

"If the regulatory and congressional environment remains hostile, there is virtual uncertainty over how we'd proceed," FedEx spokesman Maury Lane said Tuesday.

The change would "stymie competition and create an economic roadblock to recovery," he said.

"FedEx is an important Boeing customer and we understand the company's concerns about the proposed legislation," said Boeing spokesman Jim Proulx.

Did you catch that? UPS drivers have been members of the Teamsters for years. They seem to be able to do business just fine.

FedEx, Boeing, and GE are now resorting to extortion to get their way. I guess they figured lobbying and campaign contributions were no longer effective bribes.

UPDATE 3-26-09
Puget Sound Business Journal is also covering this story.

FedEx Corp. is dangling the possibility of canceling a multi-billion dollar order for new airplanes should Congress help its workers unionize.

The Memphis-based carrier noted in its third quarter filing the with SEC that in January it exercised its option to purchase 15 additional Boeing B777F aircraft and got an option to purchase 15 more.

Apparently that contract had some hefty clauses that were alluded to in the earnings report.

“Our obligation to purchase these additional aircraft is conditioned upon there being no event that causes FedEx Express or its employees not to be covered by the Railway Labor Act,” according to the filing.

Get that? They wrote it in the purchase contract! Screw labor!

More AIG Handling Rants

First of all the Republithugs are WRONG to blame this mess on Obama and the Democrats. AIG got their bailout from Paulson back in November 10, 2008. Obama was a little busy that day trying to get elected so he had nothing to do with it. This was all Henry (Hank) Paulson and George W Bush.

So why didn't Hank Paulson see this bonus fiasco coming? Well first let's look at Hank Paulson. His Wikipedia bio says:

He joined Goldman Sachs in 1974, working in the firm's Chicago office. He became a partner in 1982. From 1983 until 1988, Paulson led the Investment Banking group for the Midwest Region, and became managing partner of the Chicago office in 1988. From 1990 to November 1994, he was co-head of Investment Banking, then, Chief Operating Officer from December 1994 to June 1998; eventually as its chief executive. His compensation package, according to reports, was US $37 million in 2005, and US $16.4 million projected for 2006. His net worth has been estimated at over US $700 million.

So is this a guy who is in touch with how the rest of us live or get compensated? We know George Bush wasn't -- all of his primary imcome came from his Daddy's friends.

AIG has a long history of what we would consider compensation abuse. Here's an article in the NYT from 2005:

June 28, 2005
A.I.G. Provides Details of Executive Compensation
By GRETCHEN MORGENSON
The American International Group, the global insurance giant, spelled out yesterday the details of an unusual and secretive executive compensation plan that had for years been overseen and controlled by Maurice R. Greenberg, A.I.G.'s former chief executive.

Many details of the payments, which were made through two separate but related companies called Starr International and C. V. Starr, have not been disclosed in previous filings.

They were described in A.I.G.'s proxy statement, which was filed late yesterday in advance of its annual meeting on Aug. 11. It outlines the compensation paid in 2004 and two previous years to A.I.G.'s top executives, including Mr. Greenberg, who was ousted by the company in March.

The company, which is under investigation by federal and state prosecutors, disclosed extensive accounting irregularities this year and said in May that its earnings for the past five years would have to be restated by almost $4 billion.

By far the largest figure in the compensation tallies are the amounts earned by the executives under the long-term incentive plan operated by Starr International, a private company registered in Panama.
For example, Martin J. Sullivan, the chief executive and successor to Mr. Greenberg, received a salary of $775,000 and a bonus of $830,000 last year from A.I.G. His long-term pay under the Starr International plan was an additional $4.2 million.

The proxy also noted that Mr. Sullivan would receive a $4.9 million transition payment in cash for assuming the top job at A.I.G. this year. That payment would be in addition to his salary of $1 million.

Under the Starr International long-term pay plan, Mr. Greenberg received $10.1 million in 2004; that came on top of $1 million in salary and a bonus of $8 million from A.I.G.

...A.I.G.'s 11 top executives were allocated $42.4 million in shares under the Starr International plan last year.

...The filing also disclosed the total amounts that the A.I.G. executives have accumulated under the Starr International incentive plan over the years. At the end of last year, Mr. Greenberg had accrued shares worth $202 million based on current prices, while Mr. Sullivan had accumulated stock worth $10.6 million.
...
The company's executives have also earned significant amounts, the proxy noted, by investing in C. V. Starr, a private company that sells specialized insurance policies for A.I.G. The liquidation value of Mr. Greenberg's shares in C. V. Starr was $121 million as of last January; the shares also generated $2.8 million in dividends last year.

The value of Mr. Sullivan's shares in C. V. Starr was $10.1 million in January, the proxy said. His C. V. Starr dividends came to almost $400,000 in 2004.

Here we see AIG -- 4 YEARS AGO!! Under Paulson and Bush's watch -- under investigation, having to re-state their statements, and they are paying millions and millions to both the CEO they ousted as well as the the new CEO. They were also using Enron style off shore companies to hide this stuff. How did Paulson think this was going to turn out? Did he think that they were all of a sudden going to get responsible?

As my Momma used to say -- If you lie down with dogs expect some fleas. In this case I'd say we let a couple dogs with fleas of their own put us in a bed with a dog with mange! As Rachel Maddow says -- Scrub, rince and repeat!

Sanctimony of Contracts

Obama's top economic adviser, Larry Summers, was on This Week today.

George Stephanopoulos asked him

We learned, overnight, that the insurance giant, AIG, which has received $170 billion taxpayer dollars will start paying out today $165 million in employee bonuses. . . a lot of people simply don't understand, how can this be, especially when these bonuses are going to be going to the financial products division of the company which brought the company down?

Summers responded

George, look, there are a lot of terrible things that have happened in the last 18 months, but what's happened at AIG is the most outrageous, what that company did, the way it was not regulated; the way no one was watching, what's proved necessary is outrageous.
We are a country of law. There are contracts. The government cannot just abrogate contracts. Every legal step possible to limit those bonuses is being taken by Secretary Geithner and by the Federal Reserve system.

Where is all this concern for contracts when it comes to labor contracts like the UAW? How come mortgage contracts are off limits when they talk about "cram downs"? What about the State of Washington's contract with it's workers on pay raises?

Why are bonuses to folks who bankrupted their company so privileged for this contract protection? I'm sick of this class warfare.

UPDATE 3-16-09
Glenn Greenwald has an excellent post about this today. Also, don't miss Aaron Zelinsky's solution to the problem at Huffington.