Pelosi, Feingold Demand AIG Renounce Bonuses

[babylonsister]

Romer: "We're Pursuing Ever Legal Means" To Undo AIG Bonuses

Huffington Post/Fox News/CNN | Marcus Baram | March 15, 2009 05:02 PM


A growing bipartisan chorus of lawmakers is condemning insurance giant AIG for deciding to pay out $165 million in bonuses despite receiving $170 billion in taxpayer bailout funds and some are demanding that AIG renounce the bonuses - or else.

Senator Russ Feingold sent a letter to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, urging the Obama administration to explore "legal options" to prevent the millions in AIG payouts, reports CNN.

"I write to ask why any bonuses would be legally required, given the company's abysmal performance," says Feingold, D-Wisconsin.

Feingold asked whether the bonuses could be canceled or recouped from recipients, and whether the administration will sue AIG executives for breaching their duties to shareholders.

And some Obama administration officials seem amenable to that position.

Christina Romer, chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, told NBC's "Meet the Press":

"Can I say, we're -- we're the first people to be angry. So absolutely Secretary Geithner has been furious and has been pushing back, urging them to renegotiate this. We're pursuing every legal means to deal with it."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi issued a written statement calling the pay-outs "unconscionable" and said Congress would seek to "recover taxpayer funds of companies that abuse the privilege of taxpayer assistance," reports Fox News

"I call upon the executives at AIG to right the wrong they have done to American taxpayers, who are footing the bill for the most expensive government rescue in history. They should renounce the bonuses and refuse the excessive retention pay they previously agreed to," Pelosi said.

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., also released a written statement Sunday calling on AIG Chairman Edward Liddy to step down.

And Rep. Barney Frank, the chair of the House Financial Services Committee, said it was "wrong" on Fox News. "This is an example of people at the commanding heights of the economy misbehaving, abusing the system."

more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/15/pelosi-mcconnell-feingold_n_175131.html

[aquart]

1. Shouldn't they be required to disclose these "contractual obligations"

BEFORE we write the check? Or are these bonuses just one more liability they didn't keep track of?

[NaturalHigh]

2. I'm not a fan of Pelosi or Feingold...

but they're right on in this case. It's outrageous that our taxes are going to pay to fatten the pockets of people who share responsibility for this whole mess we're in.

[midnight]

4. In Wisconsin our Senator Feingold is well liked.

This is a another reason he will be applauded. Nice that Speaker Pelosi is on the side of preventing these outrages bonuses.

[stray cat]

8. Feingold was my senator - fiscally responsible does his homework

and fights for his constituents instead of caring what the DC establishment thinks. On top of that, I met him a few times and liked him.

[KittyWampus]

3. And Geithner looks like an impotent fool.

[lumberjack_jeff]

5. I don't get it. We own 80% of that company.

Fire the fuckers.

[femrap]

6. And these contracts are with the

boyz in the Financial/DERIVATIVES department that made the mess in the first place. If anyone in the Gov't had any damn sense, they'd fire all of them....but before that the boyz would have to train their replacements!!!! Seriously, these derivatives are the root of this mess....not the sub-prime mortgages.

If I were in NYC, I'd be out there in front of AIG HQ protesting!

[flyarm]

7. are they pissed about this?? and what are they doing about this money?

AIG Releases List of Counterparties, 65% To Foreign Banks
AIG Releases List of Counterparties, 65% To Foreign Banks
Advertisements BREAKING: AIG Releases List of Counterparties, 65% To Foreign Banks
http://firedoglake.com/2009/03/15/breaking-aig-releases ... /

By: looseheadprop Sunday March 15, 2009 4:26 pm

AIG just released its list of counter-parties (recipients of the bailout money that flowed through AIG); there are four nifty charts (PDF).


The foreign banks gambled..why is our tax money bailing out their gambling????????

Is tax money used if you gamble too much in Atlentic City or Vegas???????

How about the pensions in this country that people are losing?? or their homes , and jobs..anybody bailing them out??????????

And you want to know why small businesses are closing in record numbers in the USA..because they can't get loans and your tax dollars are paying the gambling debts of foreign banks!

[ljm2002]

15. Yes, that 65% figure is astounding...

...but it's what a lot of us suspected.

I think the reason we're being asked to cover the bets, as it were, is that these financial instruments are regarded by the rest of the world as having been fraudulent to begin with. In other words, if the US doesn't make good on them, then our name is mud and we lose our pre-eminent position in the world.

Of course, it will probably happen anyway. Hell, it's already happening. Our manufacturing base has largely disappeared, apart from defense and related industries. When it comes to exports and imports, we have adopted the profile of a 3rd World nation, exporting raw materials (like lumber and fibers) to foreign countries and importing back manufactured goods. How do ya like them apples? We've come full circle, "service" jobs aren't cutting it, the vaunted "information economy" has been co-opted coming and going (we've exported so many jobs to India, and we continue to import foreign nationals to take IT jobs in the US).

And all the while we continue to spend billions upon billions on the military and the Iraq occupation, having never gotten anything back in terms of oil revenues and certainly not in good will -- Ha! that's a laugh, if a bitter one.

And President Obama seems to think that he can muddle through the biggest financial crisis the world has seen, by appointing -- ta da! -- the same idiots who engineered the mess to begin with.

To top it all off, the Republicans and conservatives are starting to steal our populist thunder, with a drumbeat from the conservative talk radio and MSM.

It's a fine mess, all right. The only silver lining I see is that this crisis may spur creative thinking on the global stage. Unfortunately, Mr. Summers and Mr. Geithner are in over their heads. Well, Mr Summers not so much, he's an ideologue and knows what he wants. Mr. Geithner seems more sincere, but just incapable of pulling away from the systems in which he has been so deeply involved. So he can't pull back, really think outside the box, but instead he is flailing and flailing, trying to right the ship of finance using methods that can't work and that can only put our nation into a position of unsustainable debt.

President Obama, on the other hand, seems unable to grasp the level of anger out here. If he doesn't harness it to his own ends, it will turn on him and his policies. If he does not reach out his hand in a very public way to the people who are being hurt by this economic tsunami, he risks losing it all, politically speaking. If he continues to use measures that benefit Wall Street and the world's financiers, while allowing the rest of us -- i.e., those who produce the real value in the economy -- to rot, he will pay the price. I give it about one more month: he either takes bold action, or he continues to provide weak leadership on this great financial crisis. At that point, whatever he chooses to do or not do, he owns it. We can jump up and down and scream and beat our chests "but George Bush caused it", it won't matter one whit. Politics has its own reality, like it or not. I suggest to President Obama that he get outside his own ideas of what he intended his Presidency to be about, and tap into this current before it's too late. The greatest leaders, follow the lead of their people. The people are angry and they want change. Green energy is great -- but bailout money going to foreign banks and rich, stupid, evil financial fat cats is making a lot of us good and pissed.

Okay, sorry. Rant off.

[Elidor]

9. Geithner has done nothing but pretend to be tough

If he wants to retain the slightest shred of credibility, he needs to strip out the entire layer of upper management and install people who will do what they are told. If he can't do this one simple task, he fails.

[Motown_Johnny]

10. If autoworkers need to renegotiate their contract before receiving federal money

then clearly having some fat cats renegotiate their contracts to deffer bonuses in years that the company loses money seems pretty reasonable.

[mykpart]

11. Why can't the payment of bonuses be deferred

until the corporation is back on its feet?

[rainman99]

12. I think they should show how much was given to the CEO's

They are the ones who caused it to fail and I bet they gave themselves the biggest bonuses. The peons were probably told they got nothing.

[xiamiam]

13. excess and entitlement...perpetuation of the reason we are in this situation ...these guys just dont

get it...the only way change is going to happen in this country is if get in the streets...mark my words, that is going to happen...people are going to be really pissed about this..i have a feeling that this is going to be one of those heavy straws..

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

14. I sense a Sternly Worded Letter® in someone's future.

:shrug: