These are the people we are bailing out. They make more in 3 weeks than you will in a lifetime.

[girl gone mad]

The best temp gig in history
by Kim Peterson

Congress wants to crack down on CEO mega-salaries for banks participating in the bailout. And while the politicians argue how best to do that, Alan Fishman of Washington Mutual is headed for the doors with $19 million in his pocket.

If that wasn't outrageous enough, consider this: Fishman started the job three weeks ago. I never saw the employment ad Fishman answered, but it must have read something like this:

WANTED: Top executive for train-wreck bank about to be seized by federal regulators. Must be able to look busy while FDIC sells business from under you. Previous experience with angry shareholders sitting on worthless stock a plus. Perks: $7.5 million hiring bonus and $11.6 million cash severance.

Fishman got the best temp gig in history. He gets to keep the bonus and severance pay, though he must stay on the job while JPMorgan Chase completes its purchase of WaMu's banking assets.

To be fair, Fishman wasn't the one that took WaMu down a path lined with toxic mortgages and other bad assets. No, that role belonged to former CEO Kerry Killinger, who received $54 million over five years before leaving earlier this month. He's eligible for around $20 million in severance pay.

Other execs are also cashing in big. President Stephen Rotella gets $12.7 million in cash if he's terminated or quits with "good reason," according to the Portland Business Journal. And CFO Thomas Casey would get a cash severance of $6.3 million.

And WaMu shareholders got huge payments of...oh, wait. The stock is worthless. Shareholders got wiped out.

[Hydra]

1. And they're laughing all the way to the bank

While people talk about taking another one for the "team."

What team was that again? The ones that happily sold us down the river, but refuse to lose a penny?

[underdoggie]

11. re: And they're laughing all the way to the bank

does you mean
"and they're laughing all the way FROM the bank"

[Hydra]

12. I suppose I should have been specific

Their laughing all the way to the bank to pick up their check, and then flying off to South America.

That work better for you? :evilgrin:

[Beregond2]

2. WE ARE BAILING OURSELVES OUT!

Jesus, what does it take to get this through people's heads? I hate the rich as much as anyone, but cutting our own throats to spite them will get us nowhere.

[girl gone mad]

3. Read this:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/160159

WE do not need a bailout from the banks.

[frylock]

6. evidence..

that's whats it's going to take. last weds, they were saying this shit bill needed to pass by friday or we were up the fucking creek.

[BrklynLiberal]

7. There are those that disagree with you...

Dennis Kucinich
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x203055
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=108x133902

Sherman
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x203700
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4143038

and this..
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x203055

and David Cay Johnston, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his innovative coverage of our tax system, retired this year as a investigative reporter for The New York Times. He is the author of Free Lunch: How The Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expenses (and Stick You with the Bill).

FEAR AND HYPE IN THE NEWS
http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2008/09/30/hype-and-fear-in-the-news.aspx

[Two Americas]

14. straw man

No one "hates the rich."

We hate the greed, we hate the injustice, we hate the lies, we hate the cons and the scams, we hate the cheating, we hate the destruction of the country and the enslavement and impoverishment of the working people.

Reaganomics have destroyed the country. Saving Reaganomics will not save the country.

Starting in the 80's the fast talking con artists talked businesses into putting their cash on the market, and opening up lines of credit to make payroll (!!!!!) and for operating expenses. Millions were bilked into putting their retirement and life savings into the casinos....er....market. Millions were sold mortgages on the promise that real estate was soooooo solid, that would never go down, and stocks are up, up, up.

Why be old fashioned? Why not make more, more, more? Why leave your money sitting when it could be making you money? Lies, lies, lies.

This crisis was predicted by many of us when Reaganomics started as the inevitable outcome.

The whole thing was a scam right from the beginning.

Sure we are chained inside the debt slave ship, and the ship is headed for the rocks. The solution is to break the chains and take back the helm, not to fasten them tighter on ourselves and place trust in the crew that put the chains on us to begin with and are running the ship onto the rocks.

[baldguy]

4. In an earlier time these guys would be called robber barons.

[htuttle]

5. "Banksters"

Favoritest term I've heard all week.

[unblock]

8. look, let's just fire the half dozen people you hate enough to make the recession worse for everyone

i think the ceo's deserve it, too.

but i'm not going to let the fate of a tiny number of super-rich people influence my opinion on what's best for the economy as a whole.

[pberq]

9. fear-mongering

http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_plank/archive/2008/09/30/hype-and-fear-in-the-news.aspx

Now that the House has rejected the $700 billion bailout, what we have to fear is not fear itself, but fear-mongering--particularly by our leading news organizations.

Katie Couric opened the "CBS Evening News" last night with video of the House clerk declaring the 205-228 vote, and then she said, "That sets off the biggest decline in stock prices ever."

Wrong.

Brian Williams opened the "NBC Nightly News" with the same error, saying it was "the worst single day drop ever."

These are not minor errors. They are profound, ridiculous, amateur-hour errors that surely frightened many people, especially in the context of the tone of the coverage. The stock market has had much bigger one-day declines. How about right after 9/11? How about 1987, when the Dow fell 22 percentage points, more than three times the slightly less than 7 percent drop Monday?

ABC was almost as bad. Charles Gibson read from his teleprompter words that were technically accurate, but so misleading that the effect was to instill fear in the hearts of millions who did not catch the technicality. He reported "the biggest one-day point drop" in the stock market.

. . .

[unblock]

10. yes, the evening news can be a bit over dramatic, surprise, surprise

although monday's decline was huge no matter how you slice it 499 of the s&p 500 declined (campbell's soup went up).

yes, focusing on the dow number is always inaccurate, and emphasizing the numeric decline over the percentage decline is also misleading.

but they could have said, "today's decline was fucking huge by any measure" and they would have been correct, so it's hardly "fear-mongering" to have been slightly misleading in describing EXACTLY HOW fucking huge it was.

[barbtries]

13. it's so outrageous

i'm overdosing on outrage.
i mean it. can't live like this.