Let them eat cake! says the financial industry

The American people are bleeding to death, and “in the midst of an economic debacle, it is the rich who are being bailed out.”

[Taxpayers have already put up $173 billion, or more than a thousand times the amount of these bonuses, to fund the government’s AIG “rescue.” Since September 16, AIG has sent $120 billion in cash, collateral and other payouts to banks, municipal governments and other derivative counterparties around the world. This includes at least $20 billion to European banks. – “The Real AIG Outrage”, WSJ, March 17, 2009.]

AIG, received more than $170 billion in emergency federal aid, has become the chief exhibit for both sides of the bailout debate.

Executives say they must pay retention bonuses to keep employees who are unwinding its Financial Products division, which nearly brought down the insurance giant with trading in exotic derivatives. But a former senior Financial Products executive who spent eight years at the firm disagreed.

Because the division is shrinking and no longer seeking new business, many workers have lost their relevance.

The only key positions are employees who are working to extricate AIG from $2 trillion worth of outstanding contracts, the executive said. “The guys who are getting paid all the big money are not really the ones who are important to the company,” he said…

AIG could cease to exist any given day, and, in bankruptcy, the assets are taken over by solvent, better run companies. If it’s done right, the mess is cleaned up in 6 months, and its customers continue to get service, barely missing a beat.

…Several industry executives, observing the pressure being exerted on AIG and other big banks, say they are worried about joining in government efforts to rescue the financial system in the newly charged political environment.

“Am I afraid of the populist outrage? Yes,” said Lynn Tilton, chief executive of Patriarch Capital, a private-equity firm that has weighed making such an investment.

New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo yesterday questioned the value of bonus payments in retaining employees at AIG. He noted that of 73 people who received bonuses of $1 million or more, 11 no longer work at the company.

AIG declined to comment. (fat surprise there, huh?) But a person familiar with the situation said the company did not want to release the names because of privacy issues and also out of concern for the safety of the individuals.

The company has been flooded with irate phone calls and death threats in the past few days.

The new guy at AIG says that he “understood” the public fury at the bonuses. I very much doubt that. If he had any comprehension before the tsunami of anger,  he would never have signed off on them.

Now, maybe he has some notion that it wasn’t a good idea, but I don’t think he “understands” the fury of people who make, say, $40,000 a year being taxed to provide fat bonuses to people making a many hundred thousands a year and screwing up royally in the doing.

He has no idea at all what it feels like.
His income in retirement is higher than most people make in several life times of work.

Enough! We don’t want no stinking cake!!!  Said the poor to Marie-Antoinette.

But even Marie Antoinette was more in touch with the public than it seems our financial industry and government is.  She was known to have said “It is quite certain that in seeing the people who treat us so well despite their own misfortune, we are more obliged than ever to work hard for their happiness”.

 

Obama’s Changes in the first days

Obama’s first days:

Two years after launching the most technologically savvy presidential campaign in history, Obama officials ran smack into the constraints of the federal bureaucracy yesterday, encountering a jumble of disconnected phone lines, old computer software, and security regulations forbidding outside e-mail accounts.

What does that mean in 21st-century terms? No Facebook to communicate with supporters. No outside e-mail log-ins. No instant messaging. Hard adjustments for a staff that helped sweep Obama to power through, among other things, relentless online social networking.

“It is kind of like going from an Xbox to an Atari,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton said of his new digs.

…team members, accustomed to working on Macintoshes, found computers outfitted with six-year-old versions of Microsoft software.

But….All is not lost and the change begins Now!

WASHINGTON – In a first-day flurry of activity, President Barack Obama on Wednesday set up shop in the Oval Office, summoned advisers to begin dealing with war and recession and ordered new lobbying rules for “a clean break from business as usual.”

He also froze salaries for top White House staff members, placed phone calls to Mideast leaders and had aides circulate a draft executive order that would close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay within a year…

…Unveiling ethics rules that he portrayed as the fulfillment of a major campaign promise, Obama said that “the way to make government responsible is to hold it accountable.” The rules are needed, he added, “to help restore faith in government, without which we cannot deliver the changes that we were sent here to make.”

The pay freeze affects the roughly 100 White House employees who make more than $100,000 a year. “Families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington,” Obama said…

…In an attempt to deliver on pledges of a transparent government, Obama said he would change the way the federal government interprets the Freedom of Information Act. He said he was directing agencies that vet requests for information to err on the side of making information public — not to look for reasons to legally withhold it — an alteration to the traditional standard of evaluation.

Just because a government agency has the legal power to keep information private does not mean that it should, Obama said.

via

 

The Despicable Executives of the Bailout – er… “Rescue”

Just days after the “rescue”  AIG is partying!

White House press secretary Dana Perino had harsh words for the insurance giant after it was revealed this week that AIG held a $440,000 retreat for employees at the St. Regis Resort in Monarch Beach, Calif., shortly after it was propped up by taxpayer dollars last month.

AIG sent its executives to the coastal St. Regis resort south of Los Angeles even as the company tapped into an $85 billion loan from the government that it needed to stave off bankruptcy. The resort tab included $23,380 worth of spa treatments for AIG employees, according to invoices the resort turned over to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Nice!!!  But, now that is out and all the executives are relaxed, check out the new meeting coming up!

AIG Plans Meeting at California Ritz-Carlton Resort Next Week
By Erik Holm

Oct. 8 (Bloomberg) — American International Group Inc., the insurer facing criticism for hosting a $440,000 event at a California resort less than a week after a federal takeover, plans another gathering for its brokers at a Ritz-Carlton hotel next week.

The event, in Half Moon Bay in northern California, is designed to “motivate and educate” about 150 independent agents that sell AIG coverage to high-end clients, spokesman Nicholas Ashooh said. “These sorts of sales meetings are an essential function,” he said. “We have them around the world all the time.”

About 50 AIG employees will also attend the meeting. Ashooh said he didn’t know the cost of the event or whether the agents AIG is hosting would stay overnight.

So, how are you feeling about the “rescue” now?   I wasn’t very happy about it before, now I am furious!

Call your representatives and let them know if this kind of thing ticks you off too!

 

Chilling? You Betcha!

By Dana Milbank CLEARWATER, Fla. — “Okay, so Florida, you know that you’re going to have to hang onto your hats,” Sarah Palin told a rally of a few thousand here this morning, “because from now until Election Day it may get kind of rough.”

You betcha. And the person dishing out the roughest stuff at the moment is Sarah Palin.

“I was reading my copy of the New York Times the other day,” she said.

“Booooo!” replied the crowd.

“I knew you guys would react that way, okay,” she continued. “So I was reading the New York Times and I was really interested to read about Barack’s friends from Chicago.”

It was time to revive the allegation, made over the weekend, that Obama “pals around” with terrorists, in this case Bill Ayers, late of the Weather Underground. Many independent observers say Palin’s allegations are a stretch; Obama served on a Chicago charitable board with Ayers, now an education professor, and has condemned his past activities.

“Now it turns out, one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers,” Palin said.

“Boooo!” said the crowd.

“And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, ‘launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,'” she continued.

“Boooo!” the crowd repeated.

“Kill him!” proposed one man in the audience.

Palin went on to say that “Obama held one of the first meetings of his political career in Bill Ayers’s living room, and they’ve worked together on various projects in Chicago.” Here, Palin began to connect the dots. “These are the same guys who think that patriotism is paying higher taxes — remember that’s what Joe Biden had said. “And” — she paused and sighed — “I am just so fearful that this is not a man who sees America the way you and I see America, as the greatest force for good in the world. I’m afraid this is someone who sees America as ‘imperfect enough’ to work with a former domestic terrorist who had targeted his own country.”

What’s chilling is this republican campaign stirs up hate and racism and incites violence, nay, murder: and then does not condemn the behavior of their constituents.

I am embarrassed and frightened for Florida, for the republicans and for America.  I can see why the world thinks badly of us at this point.

Go to the polls and vote for America, Vote Obama.

 

Bush Backs Unlimited Compensation For Disgraced CEOs

Bush Backs Unlimited Compensation For Disgraced CEOs: Now Is Not The Time For ‘Punitive Measures’

Today, the White House released a statement criticizing Congress’s potential plan to limit CEO compensation at the companies the federal government is bailing out, firmly standing against any “punitive measures”:

We certainly understand and are sympathetic to the sentiment regarding the pay of CEOs and senior management of these firms, but we have to focus on the problem, and the problem is that we need these firms to participate in the program and sell us this debt. Having punitive measures would provide a disincentive for firms to participate, and that would make the program much less likely to succeed.

CEO compensation and corporate governance in public companies are very important issues — especially when receiving taxpayer support — but we need to be focused on fixing this problem in our markets right now. We can and should return to those issues once we get this legislation passed.

President Bush also released another statement earlier today warning Congress against inserting any “unrelated provisions” — such as help for struggling homeowners — in the $700 billion Wall Street bailout.

The Bush administration’s position is unjustifiable. As ABC News reported:

In 2007, Wall Street’s five biggest firms — Bear Stearns, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, and Morgan Stanley — paid a record $39 billion in bonuses to themselves.

That’s $10 billion more than the $29 billion loan taxpayers are making to J.P. Morgan to save Bear Stearns.

Those 2007 bonuses were paid even though the shareholders in those firms last year collectively lost about $74 billion in stock declines — their worst year since 2002.

In short, the Bush administration wants zero punishment for these wreckless CEOs who lost shareholder money and are now costing each person in the United States $2,000. In return for $700 billion, the White House has yet to name any ways that it will hold these corporations accountable or institute safeguards to ensure that this irresponsible lending and borrowing won’t happen again.

Furthermore, the White House is demanding that Congress give up its oversight powers for this deal and “place no restrictions on the administration other than requiring semiannual reports to Congress, granting the Treasury secretary unprecedented power to buy and resell mortgage debt.”

———

If not now, tell us when!  When will be the time to punish crooks that happen to be in the right wing base?  When?  When?  Or shall the rest of the nation eat cake?

I love this comment over at think progress:

---

Sez the WH –

“Having punitive measures would provide a disincentive for firms to participate, and that would make the program much less likely to succeed.”
___________

Excuse me, you mouth-breathing morons from Hell… billionaire Wall Street execs FU to the degree they’re about to take the world economy down for years to come, and “punitive measures would provide a disincentive”???

WTF are we worried about these executives leeches’ feelings for?

 

The Wall comes tumbing down….

Given that Enron-linked….

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A01E0D81038F934A25752C0A9649C8B63
..former senator, McCain economic advisor, and mortgage-industry-specializing banking lobbyist Phil Gramm…

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24844889/
…has been credited as mover and shaker behind the very law that allowed the current financial meltdown to happen, I’d love to hear what McCain and Gramm think should be done to solve this crisis?

http://www.philly.com/dailynews/local/20080701_Dave_Davies__A_few_minutes_with_McCain.html
As of yet, of course, their only response is to deny that any of it is significant. No problem, everything’s fine. Sure, people are losing their homes to foreclosure; sure, investors are being wiped out. But hey, aside from that, everything’s peachy.
Nonetheless… since McCain has indeed pegged Gramm as “one of the smartest person in the world” when it comes to economics, I’m dying to find out what Phil Gramm thinks should be done to fix the problem that Phil Gramm and the other lets-deregulate-everything Republicans helped create.

Apologies, but had to swipe this comment from the washingtonpost voices blog.

Its “fundamentally” priceless.

 

Are the American people smart..or not so smart?

From the Huffington Post I read the following excerpt from a story with the title “We’re Gonna Lose this Frickin’ Thing”:

So what is this house advantage the Republicans have? It’s the press. There is no more fourth estate. Wait, hold on…I’m not going down some esoteric path with theories on the deregulation of the media and corporate bias and CNN versus Fox…I mean it: there is no more functioning press in this country. And without a real press the corporate and religious Republicans can lie all they want and get away with it. And that’s the 51% advantage.

Think this is some opinion being wryly posited to titillate other bloggers and inspire dialogue with Tucker Carlson or Gore Vidal? Fuck that. Four corporations own all the TV channels. All of them. If they don’t get ratings they get canceled or fired. All news is about sex, blame and anger, and fear. Exposing lies about amounts of money taken from lobbyists and votes cast for the agenda of the last eight years does not rate. The end.

Adam, get a grip! Even if democrats “frickin” lose there is always next 4 years. How many times can a republican government beat and bloody the country before the country has had enough. My guess is two/three terms. Just hang on to your sanity and the republicans will eventually shoot themselves in the foot. (they always do, then dems take over and bring the country back into the real world again)

You are right however, about the 4th estate. We the people fight back on blogs, on online opinions. We know that the news is nothing more than fluff anymore. Take refuge in the fact that there is a large percentage of people that now do not even watch that non-existent 4th estate. The garner their news from the Internet from many many places, researching for themselves! Why? Because they KNOW that the news is skewed and they are tired. They want facts and they can now go and get those facts for themselves, they do not have to depend on the media that was for so many years something all Americans tuned into at 6:00 to see, say, Huntly and Brinkly. They trusted them to give Americans the facts. I will say it again, we no longer trust the media.

But, the democrats are not going to lose, so that scenario is a moot one. Eighty percent of this country is very tired of the republican antics, tired of the republican lies, tired of the republican thieves. That leaves just twenty percent that likes LIARS AND THIEVES AND CROOKS. Go figure. This year, this time, it WILL NOT WASH. Too many Americans have seen the liars for what they are.

 

The full story behind Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s 9/11 sermon

The full story behind Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s 9/11 sermon

Posted: 10:09 AM ET

As this whole sordid episode regarding the sermons of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright has played out over the last week, I wanted to understand what he ACTUALLY said in this speech. I’ve been saying all week on CNN that context is important, and I just wanted to know what the heck is going on.

I have now actually listened to the sermon Rev. Wright gave after September 11 titled, “The Day of Jerusalem’s Fall.” It was delivered on Sept. 16, 2001.

One of the most controversial statements in this sermon was when he mentioned “chickens coming home to roost.” He was actually quoting Edward Peck, former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq and deputy director of President Reagan’s terrorism task force, who was speaking on FOX News. That’s what he told the congregation.

He was quoting Peck as saying that America’s foreign policy has put the nation in peril:

“We took this country by terror away from the Sioux, the Apache, Arikara, the Comanche, the Arapaho, the Navajo. Terrorism.

“We took Africans away from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism.

“We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians, babies, non-military personnel.

“We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with stealth bombers and killed unarmed teenage and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard working fathers.

“We bombed Qaddafi’s home, and killed his child. Blessed are they who bash your children’s head against the rock.

“We bombed Iraq. We killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed a plant in Sudan to pay back for the attack on our embassy, killed hundreds of hard working people, mothers and fathers who left home to go that day not knowing that they’d never get back home.

“We bombed Hiroshima. We bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon and we never batted an eye.

“Kids playing in the playground. Mothers picking up children after school. Civilians, not soldiers, people just trying to make it day by day.

“We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff that we have done overseas is now brought right back into our own front yards. America’s chickens are coming home to roost.

“Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred. And terrorism begets terrorism. A white ambassador said that y’all, not a black militant. Not a reverend who preaches about racism. An ambassador whose eyes are wide open and who is trying to get us to wake up and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised. The ambassador said the people we have wounded don’t have the military capability we have. But they do have individuals who are willing to die and take thousands with them. And we need to come to grips with that.”

He went on to describe seeing the photos of the aftermath of 9/11 because he was in Newark, N.J., when the planes struck. After turning on the TV and seeing the second plane slam into one of the twin towers, he spoke passionately about what if you never got a chance to say hello to your family again.

“What is the state of your family?” he asked.

And then he told his congregation that he loved them and asked the church to tell each other they loved themselves.

His sermon thesis:

1. This is a time for self-examination of ourselves and our families.

2. This is a time for social transformation (then he went on to say they won’t put me on PBS or national cable for what I’m about to say. Talk about prophetic!)

“We have got to change the way we have been doing things as a society,” he said.

Wright then said we can’t stop messing over people and thinking they can’t touch us. He said we may need to declare war on racism, injustice, and greed, instead of war on other countries.

“Maybe we need to declare war on AIDS. In five minutes the Congress found $40 billion to rebuild New York and the families that died in sudden death, do you think we can find the money to make medicine available for people who are dying a slow death? Maybe we need to declare war on the nation’s healthcare system that leaves the nation’s poor with no health coverage? Maybe we need to declare war on the mishandled educational system and provide quality education for everybody, every citizen, based on their ability to learn, not their ability to pay. This is a time for social transformation.”

3. This is time to tell God thank you for all that he has provided and that he gave him and others another chance to do His will.

By the way, nowhere in this sermon did he said “God damn America.” I’m not sure which sermon that came from.

This doesn’t explain anything away, nor does it absolve Wright of using the N-word, but what it does do is add an accurate perspective to this conversation.

The point that I have always made as a journalist is that our job is to seek the truth, and not the partial truth.

I am also listening to the other sermons delivered by Rev. Wright that have been the subject of controversy.

And let me be clear: Where I believe he was wrong and not justified in what he said based upon the facts, I will say so. But where the facts support his argument, that will also be said.

So stay tuned.

– Roland S. Martin, CNN Contributorwww.rolandsmartin.com

If you want to hear the full sermon yourself, visit Roland’s blog at: www.rolandsmartin.com/blog

 

What do the Anti-Christ, and CNN Headline News have to do with America’s Presidential Elections?

Check out this CNN video where Glenn Beck discusses whether or not Obama might be the anti-christ with Rev. Hagee

Amazing!! Just simply amazing! Here we have a program called CNN Headline News talking about the “end days” of the Christian religion as something that the audience should accept as if it is a fact, a news item?

Yea, verily, last night, Glenn Beck hosted anti-Catholic bigot/fervent John McCain supporter John Hagee. And lo, there was a sound that arose from deep in Beck’s wordhole. And those sounds formed a question that sounded out across the airwaves unto disbelieving ears. That question: “Is Barack Obama the anti-Christ.”

(CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck ALSO referred to Clinton as the “Antichrist” on the June 6 edition of CNN Headline, but then again he also say that Javier Solana is the anti-christ)

We are not making this up. Glenn Beck, serious newsman, needed to find out if Barack Obama was the Devourer of Worlds, Son of Harlots, Bearer of the Mark of the Beast. John Hagee had to be thrilled by the question: somehow, Beck managed to make Hagee look reasonable.

Truth is, Beck fervently BELIEVES THAT THE END DAYS ARE HERE! He desperatly wants Obama to be the anti-christ….or maybe not, he might be scared as hell that the end times ARE here and it is time for the hateful ones to pay the piper!

Although Christianity, Judiasm, and Islam are all “Abrahamic” religions, the concept of an “anti-christ” is Christian one. The idea of an armageddon is, too, more of a Christian belief.

But, since the Hagee is coming out for McCain, my money is on McCain to be the Anti-Christ, lol.

Because..lifted from lala land:

The antichrist is supposed to come to power blah blah blah… so if he says mccain is the best person to lead the country LOL… and like every christian extremist he WANTS the end to come… is he saying he believes that Mccain is the antichrist and will lead to the end?

Who HIRES THESE PEOPLE?

 

See, this here is why Corporations have free rein to do as they wish…

Smack’em on the hands and send ’em off to do it again!  Why bother even fining them, hello?  And what about that Iraqi government…hey they are following the USA government to a tee aren’t they!  But, I guess ya can’t blame Flowserve for all of it considering Iraqi’s hand in the mess.  

 

Seems to me the Iraqi government ought to have some kind of penalty also, what about that…hmmm….no consequences for them? 

 

FLOWSERVE CORPORATION TO PAY $4 MILLION PENALTY FOR KICKBACK PAYMENTS
TO THE IRAQI GOVERNMENT UNDER THE U.N. OIL FOR FOOD PROGRAM

WASHINGTON – Flowserve Corporation (Flowserve) has agreed to pay a $4 million penalty as part of an agreement with the U.S. government regarding charges brought in connection with an ongoing investigation related to the United Nations Oil for Food program, Assistant Attorney General Alice S. Fisher of the Criminal Division announced today.

The Department of Justice today filed an agreement with Flowserve Corporation, as well as a criminal information against a Flowserve subsidiary, Flowserve Pompes SAS (Flowserve Pompes), in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The Information charges that Flowserve Pompes engaged in a conspiracy to commit wire fraud and to violate the books and records provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

According to the agreement, Flowserve has acknowledged responsibility for the actions of its subsidiary, whose employees and agents paid kickbacks to the Iraqi government in order to obtain contracts for the sale of large-scale water pumps and spare parts for use in Iraqi oil refineries. The agreement requires the company to cooperate fully with the Department’s ongoing Oil for Food investigations.

According to the criminal information and the agreement filed today, between July 2002 and February 2003, employees of Flowserve Pompes: paid a total of approximately $604,651 and offered to pay an additional $173,758 in kickbacks to the Iraqi government by inflating the price of contracts by approximately 10 percent before submitting them to the United Nations for approval; and concealed from the United Nations the fact that the contract prices contained a kickback to the Iraqi government.

In a related matter, Flowserve reached a settlement today with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under which it agreed to pay a $3 million civil penalty and approximately $3.5 million in disgorgement of all profits, including pre-judgment interest, in connection with contracts for which its subsidiary paid kickbacks to the Iraqi government. In total, Flowserve has agreed to pay approximately $10.5 million in penalties in the criminal and SEC cases.

In recognition of Flowserve’s thorough review of the improper payments and the company’s implementation of enhanced compliance policies and procedures, the Department has agreed to defer prosecution of Flowserve Pompes for three years. If Flowserve and Flowserve Pompes abide by the terms of the agreement, the Department will dismiss the Criminal Information.

The Oil for Food Program was established by the United Nations to enable Iraq to sell its oil for humanitarian purposes in the context of an extensive international sanctions regime. The program mandated that the proceeds of oil sales be deposited in a U.N. bank account and that those proceeds be used by the Iraqi government only to purchase humanitarian goods and services approved by the United Nations, such as food and medicine. Beginning in 2000, the Iraqi government began requiring companies wishing to sell humanitarian goods to government ministries to pay a kickback, often mischaracterized as an “after sales services fee,” to the government in order to be granted a contract. The amount of that fee was usually 10 percent of the contract price. Such payments were not permitted under the Oil for Food Program or other sanction regimes then in place.

The Department’s investigation of Flowserve is being conducted by the Fraud Section of the Criminal Division along with the FBI’s Washington Field Office. This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Stacey Luck with assistance from Assistant Chiefs William B. Jacobson and Robertson Park.

The Department acknowledges and expresses its appreciation of the significant, ongoing assistance provided by the Enforcement Division of the SEC in the Department’s Oil for Food investigations.