IGM The spendulus Package, AIG, etc

Inter-Galactic Memo
To: All Personnel
Fr: W. Leavitt, sore loser
Re: AIG, the spendulus package, other oddities

I had something in mind when I started this, but the sheer magnitude of topics, the plethora of criticisms available, makes it difficult to know where to begin. So I’ll just do what I always do; write whatever comes to mind. I suppose we’ve all been following this AIG bonus story and how congress and the president are screaming about the money being given away to employees after AIG received billions of dollars in bail-out money. Fair enough. I have always been skeptical of the sums of money given to CEO’s and top executives. It makes one suspicious that rather than being a reward for excellent work, it is just a system for spreading the wealth—which is a plank in the current administrations platform. They just don’t like it when they don’t get their cut. It should be done ‘democratically’, not through a good-old-boy system. It looks like Ed Libby is doing his best to save that company, but with all this help from the government AIG is doomed.
I do have a problem or two with the current righteous indignation being displayed by some of the people on Capitol Hill. Barney Frank is calling for investigations, indictments, and is working on a bill that would require those at AIG receiving bonuses to return it—as if Congress has any right to do such a thing in the private sector—like it or not, AIG has done nothing illegal, or even unusual. Another bill, already endorsed by our own Harry “dingy harry” Reid, would require a tax on all corporate bonuses of 90%--yes someone is actually introducing that. And you though the whole “socialism” thing was just hyperbole.
By the way, everyone knew three months ago that AIG, long before they were given bail-out money, was going to be handing out the bonuses—bail-out or not—because they told everyone about it and that they were contractually obligated to do so. Remember contracts? Remember how upset we were when the state of Nevada decided to cut our salaries this year despite our contract? So now they are all lining up to posture about their indignation. This almost rises to the level of hypocrisy . . . .
And what about all those people (3 that I know of) who were working for Fanny and Freddie and got their shares of 100 million dollars in bonuses before they were tagged to be part of the current administration? Shall we mention Barney and Harry and Chris and Nancy again, and how they were knowingly culpable in propping up Freddie and Fanny long after it was known—and they had been warned—that those lending institutions were going to fail? (We will not mention that criminal Bush and his administrations repeated attempts to get someone to do something about the impending bursting of the bubble).
Then we have our President comparing Tim Geitner to our first Sec Tres., Alexander Hamilton. That took guts. Isn’t Geitner the one who couldn’t figure out what he owed taxes on? And got that huge bonus from Freddie and/or Fanny? Who else would you pick to run the Treasury? Al Capone comes to mind; at least he’s dead and couldn’t do any damage.
All this outrage and anger and name-calling by congress is laughable. They caused the problem in the first place, and are making it worse now. It takes a lot of chutzpah to shoot someone in the head in front of witnesses, then call a press conference demanding an investigation and vowing to find out who is responsible. And I’m going to go out on a limb here and predict that passing a law requiring a 90% tax on bonuses isn’t going to help fix the problem.
A new poll has more people saying they would vote Republican over Democrat for the first time in over two years—that didn’t take long. It’s only by two points, but the change is significant all things considered. Congress had better watch their backs, if you know what I mean. And now they’re crying over all the pork in the spendulus package—you know, the one nobody had time to read—demanding investigations, etc., when it’s their pork. Is anyone else reminded of the Keystone Cops in all of this? It’s going to be fun watching what is rapidly becoming the country’s most amateurish leadership in history as they continue to break their own records for incompetence and ignorance. Not that any of us are keeping score.