Ineptitude ... AIG, TARP Revisited

During his campaign and notably since taking office, Obama has been posturing for his Socialist agenda by pitting populism against the wealthy in America to entrench and further deepen the class schism.

Obama's latest overture - his recent "outrage" over AIG's latest abuse of TARP money - has been to exploit the same for political purposes. But in singlemindedly pursuing his socialist goals he's lost track of some other realities.

If he really gave a damn about taxpayer's money he would have "vetoed" the stimulus appropriations bill that wastes BILLIONS instead of ranting about AIG's millions in bonus payments. Given that he took such a strident position against "earmarks" and that he would champion the stewardship of taxpayer's interest - when it came to tackling the reality of confronting the political interests of Congressional legislators who sponsor "earmarks" - he limply backed away, saying in effect, "well, it's just an old business item carried over from last year; but we'll really address the earmark problem on future appropriations bills.". That's nice, it's only going to cost us 8 billion that could have been prevented.

Well, by signing that bill he not only squandered our money, but his credibility too.

Now he should re-think expressing his "outrage" over AIG.

Presumably some of these people at AIG have specialized knowledge on how to run that business. Unfortunately, we now own most of AIG, to the tune of 80% .

At this point what injures Americans the most ? Should AIG be abandoned and allowed to collapse - or do we continue to prop it up? If, it's the latter, then the same people are necessary to keep AIG functioning, and Obama's and Congress' rantings and threats aren't going to yield optimum performance over at AIG; to the contrary they will insure further failed performance. Yeah, it's piss poor that our leadership and legislators didn't heed the warnings or care and know enough about how to protect our interests before they rushed head long to pass TARP. But what is in our best interests now? It's certainly not the spew coming out of Washington from the politicians.

Obama also needs to consider whether or not he's setting this up for further backlash in Congress. Congress is going to be very hard pressed to justify the next 30 billion round of funding for AIG - and it's coming up soon - let alone any more so called TARP rescue for other financial institutions.

Secretary Geithner's and Treasury's accountability in all this is under scrutiny as well, with calls already for Geithner's resignation! Geithner says he will get all of the bonus payment money back from AIG. Wake up idiot, "WE OWN AIG - you're going to get it all back from US ! ".

Schumer, Dodd, Reid, Grassely, Pelosi, Frank and others are foaming at the mouth to pass some sort of legislation that targets the individuals who received the bonuses; interestingly those who are complaining the loudest bear the greatest responsibility for failing miserably to protect taxpayers in the first place.

The "thinking" of these legislators is especially dangerous - it is "wrong" when government resources are used to "punish" those who are not in political favor or seen as undeserving. In Europe, where they have had decades of injury, misery and suffering from totalitarian and fascist regimes, they understand just how dangerous this kind of political "thinking" is. There are real constitutional problems with what these legislators want to do, and they will be called to account for it.

Some voices are pushing for the bonus agreements between AIG and its employees to be blocked, voided or rescinded - essentially to interfere with legally binding contracts. If no fraud was involved, you can be certain litigation will follow and lost and the cost burden will be borne by the American public at greater expense than the bonus payments alone.

Because of Obama's ineptitude and his fanning the flames of outrage, responsibility for all of this can be laid at the Whitehouse's doorstep.

Lastly, AIG's abuses are only prelude - is there anyone in Congress or the Administration so gullible to believe that with the BILLIONS of dollars yet to be distributed from the stimulus bill that more financial abuses, fraud and voter outrage aren't on the way? Unfortunately, we already know the answer!

Yeah, this really is change we can believe in !