The Government Thinks You're Stupid!

In the movie "Network" (1976) Howard Beale (Peter Finch) galvanizes the nation with his rant, "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" and persuades Americans to shout out their windows during a spectacular lightning storm. Howard Beale's attempt to improve his dismal ratings as an anchor for the UBS Evening News temporarily succeeds.

President Obama goes on Jay Leno and galvanizes the nation saying that he was stunned when he learned of the bonuses that bailed-out insurance giant AIG was paying its employees. "We're going to do everything we can to get these bonuses back", he declared. President Obama's also defended Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner for his work on the AIG bailout. The President's attempt to improve his ratings temporarily succeeds. But how long will his "rock star" image remain?

After much talk about the $165 million in AIG bonuses, it has now come to realization that both Senator Dodd and President Obama were the two largest recipients of AIG campaign money. They were the only two politicians that received over $100,000, in 2008, from the failing company. Dodd received $103,100 and then Senator Obama received $100,332. AIG gave more than $585,000 to Congressional and Presidential Candidates last year favoring Democrats 3 to 1 over Republicans.

“While AIG was collapsing, and her executives crawling to DC with hat in hand,” said Senator Dodd, “my campaign, and then-Senator Obama’s were getting what can only be termed influence bonuses from the same firm. Naturally, I knew nothing about this, and I’m now seething with anger at the injustice.”

I am glad to see you are on top of things Senator Dodd. This makes me very comfortable to know that my tax dollars are going to issues that you “know nothing about.” Dodd allowed AIG to rake in BILLIONS in his home state of Connecticut and allowed the AIG contracts that provided the bonuses, but now will work his tail off to get every dollar back? Nice try Senator Dodd. Why don’t you just tell us the truth?

Who were the officials responsible for designing and implementing the AIG bailout? Tim Geithner (who, before he was Obama's Treasury Secretary was head of the New York branch of the Federal Reserve Bank); Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke; Bush's Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson (previously Goldman Sachs' Chairman). Moreover, according to the New York Times, also present at the key Federal Reserve meetings last September which decided to let Goldman Sachs competitor Lehman Brothers fail, but to rescue AIG, was current Goldman Sachs Chairman Lloyd C. Blankfein. According to the Times, Goldman Sachs was AIG's largest trading partner, and "a collapse of the insurer threatened to leave a hole of as much as $20 billion in Goldman's side." We now learn that Goldman received $12.6 billion from the AIG bailout (as well as tens of billions more from other Federal bailout funds.) But at the time, Goldman's spokesman claimed, apparently falsely, that "our exposure to AIG was, and is, not material." In February, the very same Goldman Chairman Blankfein denied to the House Financial Services Committee that Goldman had a major stake in bailing out AIG. It now turns out that AIG and Blankfein were not being truthful. Moreover, Geithner must have known they weren't being truthful and chose to keep it a secret from the American people and from Congress. And now to make your eyes bleed, AIG sent out about 40 billion of the bailout package to foreign banks (mostly French and German), 22 in all.

Now that our government has proven their extraordinary expertise, I can't wait for them to work on managing health care (not to include wounded soldiers), climate change, paying your mortgage and credit card debt, family values, STD's, the Charlie Rangel tax evasion trial and the pardon of Jack Bauer. You can forget an economic recovery plan for now as there is no plan and Obama and the Democrats can still find it easy to blame George W. Bush for your dwindling 401K.

Next election, vote out all the incumbents while screaming: "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!"

Your comments on this article are always appreciated.

This entry was posted on March 20th, 2009 at 12:36:38 am and is filed under In The News.

2 comments

Comment from: Kahuna4U [Visitor]

Right on! The corruption by politicians make me sick! They vote to give corporations a loophole then fake rightous indignation when the corporation uses the loophole. If the corporation has to give back then let Obama and Dowd give back. Then move to another country!

03/20/09 @ 14:05

Comment from: Mad About..... [Visitor]

"America, we need change and we need it now!" Sound familiar? This was the cry of the Obama and Clinton campaigns. Yet amongst the war cry, there seems to be a sense of satisfaction over this "economic disastery". I am not mad that someone in the government is trying to do something that was supposed to work differently than it currently is. What disgusts me is the fact that the same people who are crying for change are not changing anything. It is not that fact that AIG needed money. It is the fact that AIG executives, got what their contracts stated (bonuses) and then left the corporation for future ventures. Not only that but if the government had properly done their investigation as to the contractual agreements with the AIG executives, it would have been extremely simple to state that all government dollars are to be allocated to growth and stabilization....not personal greed. When I had a business, no one was there to bail me out...When I was laid off, the government did assist with a whopping $325 per week. If you and I did what these executives had done, we would have been jailed on investment fraud. Yet, in the "Almighty" understanding of our current "Change" democratic government, we may have now sustained a possible depression. The media is playing this whole thing down, but do not let the media fool anyone, if growth is to come to America, then there needs to be a change in leadership and accountability among the government and business executives. If this 3rd party type of accountability does not happen, then God help us all. If you want to see change, then do it yourself...If you want someone to change things for you, then do nothing. However, the richest and wisest people state, "Do something instead of doing nothing. When you do something, you get somewhere. When you do nothing, then failure is immenent". President Obama, stop running on a treadmill and start doing what you promised. Mr. President, change can only come when you have the right advisors. You need a new crew!!!!!

03/25/09 @ 09:15

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The Government Thinks You're Stupid!

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