Ok then blame Obama. His treasury department insisted on the wording that allowed the bonuses all while Obama has been in apoplectic rage against the Bonus pay-outs. Either way it was a total screw up and then Congress passed an unconstitutional bill of Attainder to tax away the bonuses they approved. But we have two threads on how Bush violated the constitution. The hypocrisy burns.
Dodd - I did it.
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applecorped
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He did it before he didn't not do it.
Skeptic Ginger
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As more comes out about this incident, I have decided to withdraw judgment and wait and see. However, what I heard Dodd say was that he put the language back in that removed limits on these bonuses because the treasury department officials directed him to.
Clearly there is more here than meets the eye.
Roadtoad
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Folks, could we have some fair assessment of what Dodd actually did? I don't like him either, wish like hell he'd leave, but a little accuracy would help. (Saying this because I got bitten in the ass, myself.)
You might want to take a look at these links.
You might want to take a look at these links.
Skeptic Ginger
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The picture is confusing to say the least.
Tim Geithner looks involved and that makes Obama look bad, not just for picking him, but continuing to act as if Geithner is on the people's side when it looks more and more like Geithner is instead in bed with the corporate boards and CEOs of AIG, Goldman Sachs, and who knows which other companies.
But why did Dodd at first say, not me, then mia culpa a day later?
In the mean time, the FDIC chairperson, Sheila Bair, was on the news today saying when they take over a failed bank they have the authority to terminate all contracts, including bonus contracts.
This Rolling Stone article was posted in another thread, The Big Takeover - The global economic crisis isn't about money - it's about power. How Wall Street insiders are using the bailout to stage a revolution . It sheds even more light on the situation.
I'm hoping there is a snowball rolling down the hill here that will prevent putting the lid back on this situation. As CT as it sounds, I'm hoping the corporations not involved in the financial markets, in particular the big 6 which have a monopoly on the majority of the mainstream news media markets (except the Net), are not in bed with the financial corporate monopolies and therefore have a keen interest in exposing the fraud.
It's time for the right winger/Libertarian leaning half of the country to suck it up, and help push for a government takeover of all the financial corporations involved in this scam and clean them up. Fire all the greedy boys (and I'll bet the women involved in this are a minority, perhaps a thread on that is in order). Then they can be put back in private hands.
And no one in those top tax brackets should be whining they don't have to pay their share of the meltdown with higher tax rates. Regardless of who is to blame, many people in the bottom tax brackets are losing their jobs altogether. The top bracket folks with their influence in Congress pushed to have union contracts renegotiated. There doesn't seem to be an issue letting the poor take the hit. Higher taxes on the upper brackets is in order. They certainly are not currently creating wealth or jobs anyway.
FlamingMoe
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If anyone's not reading articles it would seem to be you. Apparently, you're not even paying attention to your own posts:
Emphasis added.
NoZed Avenger
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It appears (from the testimony before the Congress and the later news stories) that everyone knew these bonuses were coming. They also knew a lot of money was being given out from AIG to a number of banks and financial institutions. (cf 5-6 of the list of top 20 political contributors to both parties in the last few years, make of that what you will).
The problem appears to be that Geithner, among others, believed that stopping the bonuses might either invite lawsuits by interfering with existing contracts and/or create disincentives and uncertainty for firms that might otherwise want to avail themselves of bail-out funds. He and the Congress found themselves in a fix.
Keep in mind, Congress and the Administration were hammering hard on bankwers in general and on executives getting bonuses in particular. They just spent a *lot* of time excoriating those guys in the press. Personal opinion, this excoriation was partially in order to provide political cover for the huge amounts of money being funneled away to those campaign contributors (right or wrong, it might look bad), and partially because with the huge failures in oversight by the SEC and Congress, persons of both parties really, *really* needed a bad guy to point at. ("Look over there at that bad, bad executive and his bonuses just long enough to forget we were in charge of Fannie and Freddie when they went under, dragging half the economy with them!").
So, the Committee trying to reconcile the House and Senate versions had a problem. They were getting pressure from Treasury to let the money go through, meanwhile the Administration and Congress had just finished trying to look like common-folk by passing out free torches, pitchforks, and maps to New York in an attempt to have the angry citizenry storm Wall Street instead of DC.
Admitting the full truth would be uncomfortable. When first questioned about this kind of thing, the initial impulse appears to have been (from Dodd, at least), to make some vague statements that might satisfy a casual type of inquiry. When that didn't seem to quell everything, step 2 is to shift blame. (again, it doesn't really matter whether the shifting is right or wrong -- here, Treasury's fingerprints are all over the thing).
The complaint about Dodd is not really whether his "original" language might have stopped this or who on the committee actually parsed the final language. It is the simple fact that it appears everyone talking about this is playing "button, button, whose got the button?" and blame-shifting games instead of making a case for what they actually did.
It seems clear from the various articles that everyone damn well knew what the final language did, and they're all now "shocked, shocked" to find out there is gambling in the establishment.
My take.
The problem appears to be that Geithner, among others, believed that stopping the bonuses might either invite lawsuits by interfering with existing contracts and/or create disincentives and uncertainty for firms that might otherwise want to avail themselves of bail-out funds. He and the Congress found themselves in a fix.
Keep in mind, Congress and the Administration were hammering hard on bankwers in general and on executives getting bonuses in particular. They just spent a *lot* of time excoriating those guys in the press. Personal opinion, this excoriation was partially in order to provide political cover for the huge amounts of money being funneled away to those campaign contributors (right or wrong, it might look bad), and partially because with the huge failures in oversight by the SEC and Congress, persons of both parties really, *really* needed a bad guy to point at. ("Look over there at that bad, bad executive and his bonuses just long enough to forget we were in charge of Fannie and Freddie when they went under, dragging half the economy with them!").
So, the Committee trying to reconcile the House and Senate versions had a problem. They were getting pressure from Treasury to let the money go through, meanwhile the Administration and Congress had just finished trying to look like common-folk by passing out free torches, pitchforks, and maps to New York in an attempt to have the angry citizenry storm Wall Street instead of DC.
Admitting the full truth would be uncomfortable. When first questioned about this kind of thing, the initial impulse appears to have been (from Dodd, at least), to make some vague statements that might satisfy a casual type of inquiry. When that didn't seem to quell everything, step 2 is to shift blame. (again, it doesn't really matter whether the shifting is right or wrong -- here, Treasury's fingerprints are all over the thing).
The complaint about Dodd is not really whether his "original" language might have stopped this or who on the committee actually parsed the final language. It is the simple fact that it appears everyone talking about this is playing "button, button, whose got the button?" and blame-shifting games instead of making a case for what they actually did.
It seems clear from the various articles that everyone damn well knew what the final language did, and they're all now "shocked, shocked" to find out there is gambling in the establishment.
My take.