Rahm: Obama Believes AIG Mess Is A “Big Distraction”
White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel offers an intriguing glimpse into President Obama’s thoughts about the AIG furor:
As angry as the president is at the news about A.I.G., which he learned Thursday, Mr. Emanuel said, “his main priority is getting the financial system stabilized, and he believes this is a big distraction in that effort.”
Without polling on the question, it seems best to reserve judgment on how damaging the AIG mess is to the White House. Many news orgs and commentators have been asserting as outright fact that public outrage is a huge political problem for Obama without, you know, any empirical evidence of this. Obviously it’s very possible that it’s a major problem. We just don’t know for sure one way or the other yet.
That said, the AIG mess isn’t just some sideshow. And it seems like an odd move for the White House to describe it as a “distraction” at a time when Republicans are moving aggressively to paint the Obama administration as weak and passive on AIG in order to position themselves as the heroic defenders of the taxpayers here.
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That does seem an odd and somewhat off-key note Emanuel hits there. I don’t doubt that it’s a true reflection of what the economics advisors (and Obama) actually think but it’s spun pretty poorly, assuming that related comments by Emanuel weren’t left out.
But, yes, the measure of ‘populist’ sentiment for so many in Washington who are reporting or commenting on the news seems to be their measure of the sentiment of those in Washington reporting or commenting on the news.
Still, I’m anxious. There is the potential for a blame-ravenous populist beast out there and, if things degrade too much in the national and world economy, it’s not a sure thing as to whom that beast will start eating.
Obama is too smart for this…I love the guy.. I really do. And I agree with a lot of his policies… but this is just ridiculous… and it could have been handled a lot better. Geithner needs to be canned. I have no confidence in this guy..and he doesn’t even look like he knows what he’s talking about. Every time I see him on TV he looks like someone who just peed their pants. He needs to go!
I personally feel like the criticism of Geitner is overheated. For all of the complaints I haven’t exactly seen anybody come up with a different/better plan to handle the financial crisis. Having said that I believe that he has handled the executive compensation question very poorly. The truth is its all kabuki theater. The money paid out in bonuses is a drop in the bucket when you are talking about the truck loads of money delivered to bail out AIG. But the optics are bad and just like with earmarks the media is prone to blowing this up to crisis proportions. Still more and more banks are saying that they are back to being profitable now so evidently SOMETHING is working. I don’t really care if Geitner is a great speaker, I just want him to get the financial sector stabilized. Honestly I don’t remember ever even seeing Hank Paulson before last fall and if the banks get stabilized I am pretty sure we won’t see much more of Geitner either. However maybe for now they should just keep putting Summers out for speaking purposes and let Geitner work behind the scenes. The media has made a caricature out of him at this point without any real reason for doing so. I saw him testifying before Congress and I thought he did a good job and knew what the hell he was talking about but President Obama will lose if they allow the media to continue making everything about Geitner. Nobody even noticed that the Dow went up like 100 pts yesterday. This after weeks of saying the market was falling because nobody had confidence in Geitner. They are going to keep tailoring stories to make every problem Geitner’s problem and every success will go underreported. Thats the way the world is now and the White House better recognize that and soon.
Oh, please. The endless calling for heads is absurd. The guy has been in the job for six weeks. He’s not going to be fired, nor should he be. Just as calling for Liddy’s head is ridiculous. He’s a complete idiot for writing that they couldn’t possibly let down the “best and the brightest,” but he wasn’t there when the company went down.
Well it is a distraction really.
The bonuses were based on the previous year’s income, not the present year and were contractual. I hate everything about it and I singed petitions and complained, but essentially, these bonuses won’t break or make the economy. They just make people mad.
And I still don’t understand how Obama gets blamed for this.
sq and evie – I think you guys have this right. Cable news networks maintain their viability through pumping up whatever potential conflicts might be kicking around. As morally outraged as I am by what these boys and girls in the financial world have been up to, I feel about as qualified to pronounce on corrective fiscal/regulatory policies as I would if asked how to get an old Dodge pickup into orbit.
Tena
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Obama gets blamed because we just backed up another truckload of money to AIG to the tune of 30 billion last month and he could have attached conditions to the money that the bonuses not be paid. The problem really and truly is that they underestimated the public’s reaction to this. What they should have done is come out and bashed AIG from the moment they knew about the bonuses instead of coming out on Sunday saying there was nothing they could do to break the contracts. That for d@mn sure wasn’t the sentiment when they were dealing with the Big 3 and their labor contracts so why should AIG be any different? This particular time it IS President Obama’s fault primarily because of their media strategy.
but President Obama will lose if they allow the media to continue making everything about Geitner.
Lose what, darlin? What can he lose? He’s president for 4 years and this isn’t going to carry over that far.
People are just mad and they’ve found some one thing they can focus on. I’ve had 4 different people tell me in the last few days that the government should have just given money to us instead of the banks. Yeah that works – about half the people I know would immediately go hood-rich and spend $10,000 on drugs and the other money on cars, rims, trips, clothes, jewelry – everything but paying their bills. For heaven’s sake – we haven’t demonstrated any more responsibility than AIG or any of the banks.
Obama gets blamed because we just backed up another truckload of money to AIG to the tune of 30 billion last month and he could have attached conditions to the money that the bonuses not be paid.
exactly how? Seriously. Those bonuses were contractual and the government really has no power to abrogate a contract.
Anyone else following banking stuff over in Britain? Here’s one item which points to the misbehavior of these very big and powerful institutions and how tough it can be to get to them… http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/mar/18/barclays-guardian-gag-tax-papers
Tena
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Please believe that this isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. If Geitner continues to be painted as incompetent by the media and President Obama keeps standing beside him it had better rain gold in the next year or so or none of the rest of President Obama’s agenda will get passed and that includes his budget and all of his initiatives on green energy, health care reform, and education. Thats the reality and the gravity of the situation. Everything is going to come back to Geitner and the fact that he is one of President Obama’s closest economic advisors. If the media and the Republicans are able to successfully discredit the guy then every single initiative that costs tax payer money will come under scrutiny and Obama’s approval ratings and political capital will take a major hit. Whether we like it or not perception is reality many times in this country and there will be consequences if they don’t nip this in the bud.
Tena
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The labor contracts of the unions of the Big 3 should also be sacrosanct then right? So why did the government tell them that a condition of them getting bailed out was renegotiating those labor contracts and for the workers to make great concessions. Again this is a matter of consistency especially for an administration that wants to appeal to the middle class. If the union workers have to renegotiate their pay and benefits for bailout money then the same should have had to be done to the employees of AIG. Remember that the Big 3 are also supposedly too big to fail.
Please believe that this isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. If Geitner continues to be painted as incompetent by the media and President Obama keeps standing beside him it had better rain gold in the next year or so or none of the rest of President Obama’s agenda will get passed and that includes his budget and all of his initiatives on green energy, health care reform, and education.
Please believe me – I think you need to chill. It’s not that serious.
Tena
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Its one thing to support President Obama, its another thing to be blind to political realities. It is what it is.
Its one thing to support President Obama, its another thing to be blind to political realities. It is what it is.
And it’s a third thing to go completely off the cliff over this and claim Obama is doomed.
Pull up your socks. You think this doesn’t make me mad? My husband gave up his bonus and he earned it last year – he volunteered to give it up so non-executive personnel could have bonuses and raises. Then his brother and his siser’s husband both lost their income and have come to us – our retirement is gone and we were going to retire soon. Now I don’t know if my husband is ever going to retire.
I’m mad as hell, but I’m not crazy and I do know what a contract means. That’s the first class everyone in law school takes, the very first year.
This is a distraction like Natasha Richardson had a little fall and bumped her head. These guys are the masters of the web and the newscycle, and they have to get back to basics. They cannot be on offense at all time, and when they are, they have to protect the ball. The Republicans are kicking and biting down in the bottom of the pigpile, and trying like hell to strip the ball. So while this may seem ridiculous, and I don’t want to see Geithner canned, I do want to see a designated ***-kicker on their team. And somebody who all along is the reality check so this stuff doesn’t happen again. Maybe they need to loop Marion Robinson in and see what she says.
Also, to add another metaphor: both my kids are Special Ed. And what you learn over the years is strategies. Obama may be teacher-in-chief, but you have to teach it more than one way, more than once, to make sure everybody gets it. And then review, replay, reiterate. In different styles.
This AIG bonus bumbling is a distraction, and one that the political opposition is all too willing to exploit. Word – we need to move forward before we begin eating ourselves. If Sen. Wyden’s measure was stripped during the conference committee mark up, this moment belongs to Congress, not per se the WH. The anti-recovery forces know a wedge when they see one. Massaging angry populism is what Obama’s detractors are fomenting, and if we take the bait, this distraction will grow a more menacing political life than it already has! -Kevo
Tena
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I didn’t say he was doomed. Notice the IF in my statement. But again I point to the union contracts with the Big3. What you aren’t getting is that any contract can be renegotiated and in many cases broken if one party feels there is a material breach and I would say running the company in the ground is in fact a material breach of the contract. But bigger than that hell let them pay the bonuses, but President Obama could have withheld their bailout money just like he was threatening to do with the Big 3. Its not what the law says or whether this will affect the economy negatively, its about PERCEPTION. Thats why the running meme this morning is that Geitner knew about these bonuses for months but never moved to stop them which is again trying to paint him as incompetent and not up for the job which is how they have been trying to paint him for weeks. These are attacks that have the possibility of actually strike a chord. You have to remember that everyone is not like you and me and will support Obama’s agenda because we believe in it. There were people who voted for Obama simply because they thought he was the lesser of two evils and their support is not nearly as strong. And that is why this is in fact a big deal.
Obama is absoutely right.
He and his economic team need to stay focused on dealing with toxic assets, stabilizing the housing market, getting credit to flow again, overhauling our national regulatory infrastructure and creating the kind of economic environment that translates into +SUSTAINABLE GREEN JOBS.
In the grand scheme of things, the recovery of the US economy does not hinge on whether or not AIG gives out these bonuses. Our national economy – the global economy – is not going to crash because of the AIG bonuses.
Is it an appalling, moral outrage that AIG would even consider honoring these bonus contracts? No question about it.
Should Congress and Treasury officials be going balls-out to find ways to get AIG to do the right thing? Absolutely.
Will there be a political price for someone to pay because the profligate greed of the financial industry runs rampant still, even as regular working stiffs continue to lose their jobs, their houses, their children’s college savings, their retirement savings and the simmer of populist outrage has reached the boiling point? No doubt.
But seriously, all outrage aside, what to do about AIGs bonus compensation contracts in light of the bailout are all tactical questions about corporate management and process oversight – important, certainly, but not existential to the life of the economy.
Badgering the President for a direct response to AIGs corporate turpitude seems, to me, oddly misplaced.
Triage isn’t pretty, and the nation’s obsessive hyperfocus on what amounts to a minuscule quantity of blood loss is wildly disproportionate to the other, more life-threatening problems our economic patient faces.
Personally, it is a relief to know – and I take it as a sign of hope – that at least the President has his priorities straight.
and I would say running the company in the ground is in fact a material breach of the contract. B
I would say I would have to see the K before I can determine what is and isn’t a breach of the agreement.
but President Obama could have withheld their bailout money
Obama just found out about the bonuses last Thursday.
AND the year they are betting paid bonuses for is not the year the company failed – it’s the preceding year.
This is just a distraction. There is so much to do. These bonuses were a done deal (seemingly anyway) and there is so much else to worry about that I think they decided to get past it. Until the reporters got hold of the story. If people start quitting, it will only hurt us since we own AIG. We need them to succeed so I suppose we need the people that know their job. I seet his as a lot of noise about not much. Sure it would be nice to get the money back, but where is all the outrage about all the other bonuses paid out already? Where is the outrage about our money being sent to foreign banks, so they can make profits while we don’t? There are bigger and more important stories out there but the press has latched onto this one and are beating it to death, to the detriment of future attempts to save the financial system. It is all very childish and short-sighted and dare-I-say self-defeating?
Now just to wind this up: AIG made bad employment decisions when they entered these contracts with these people but the deal was done. I would hope that companies don’t do this anymore – and if legislation is needed to prevent it then Congress needs to go to work.
It’s just that it’s bit late with AIG – contracts were entered into long before any of this happened. I hate the contracts and never have understood why some people get these insane bonuses. But that was the AIG’s hiring decision in the past. Under different management.
The problem the administration has is they harped about the lack of “oversight” in the original TARP money & and blamed the republicans (right or wrong) – and they SOLD it to the people over and over.
Now it turns out their own oversight is worse. The whole Dodd thing inserting the amendment into the stimulus bill (the one no one had the time to read – because of the dire emergency at hand) – and the rush to sign into law. Their feigned righteous indignation is looking a bit thin –
It would be one thing is TARP happened two years ago, but it was passed only 5 months ago, and only half of it was used by the Bush administration.
I suspect there is more to come.
Tena
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You can say that President Obama didn’t know until recently about the bonuses but the fact that the contracts were entered into last year would mean one of two things, either President Obama and his team are incompetent and never asked, or at least somebody in his cabinet DID know. It doesn’t help that Geitner recently said that the administration knew where every cent from AIG was going. Thats reality. Now as for the contracts they were supposed to be based on last year which in point of fact WAS the year that they failed. Thats why they were paid out this year. This compensation wasn’t for 2007, it was for 2008.
kenyg
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Dodd didn’t sneak any amendment into the stimulus bill. His amendment was voted on and it does in fact limit executive compensation going forward. Its just another lie to try to smear him.
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http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/03/17/dodd/index.html
I don’t see this sticking on Obama or his administration, I think blame is rightly being put on the greedy AIG fat cats. I know the MSM and Republicans are trying to make this stick on Obama but I just don’t really see it happening.
This was in the contract before Obama or Geithner took over – now Geithner very well could have realized this stinks, however we’re talking less than one tenth of one persent of the overall AIG price tag and Geithner probably figured his focus and energy was better suited elsewhere. I mean why focus on $180M when you’re worried about $2T+?
This is the same issue as the earmarks – the GOP cherrypicks some fractional spending and runs with it making it a huge issue – it really is a distraction. Now everybody is up in arms, the media has their story and is fanning the flames so both political parties are running with it focused on writing their own bills to rectify the matter, Obama, Geithner and Co. have to waste time and energy defending it all the while the much larger economic issues are put on the back burner.
sgwhiteinfla:
Point taken, it was not Dodd, but Tim Geithner and Larry Summers –
That makes it even worse for Obama. The senate voted for that thing sight unseen – at Obama’s behest…
not good.
I don’t think the problem is that Geithner is “incompetent”-it’s that he and Summers are obviously on the side of their Wall Street friends and loath to do anything that upsets their applecart. As was pointed out, if Geithner could demand that the automakers change their contracts with the unions, there is no reason on earth that he couldn’t have used the same heavy-handed technique with AIG–the fact is, he didn’t want to. And this smearing and lying about Dodd is really too much–done by the White House-Obama is beginning to look like a real backstabber. In the long run, the bonuses may indeed be a drop in the bucket–but this fraudulent activity by Wall Street will continue until you have someone who is committed to cleaning up the mess. And that is neither Geithner nor Summers. When Paulson was runnign around saying “the sky is falling, give me total power and no oversight or else” I had the sinking feeling this was the Bush/Paulson last-ditch attempt to loot the treasury and give the proceeds to their friends. And it was. And the longer we the people keep quiet about it, the more we resemble the fools these elite “masters of the universe” so obviously think we are. Now with the Obama admin, it is more of the same. They didn’t know about these contracts??? Horsesh— It’s Chris Dodd’s fault? Total lie. At least Cuomo is demanding to see the contracts and wants to publish the names of the bonus recipients–what, the gov can tap my phone and read my email but these destroyers of wealth deserve privacy? This is economic terrorism and it MUST be stopped. The debt we are incurring will be passed along to our children and grandchildren–what will their lives be like? what kind of opportunities will be closed off to them because of this meltdown? These Wall Street ******** are counting on us to keep ignoring their misdeeds–and they are in bed with Washington. ENOUGH.
Geithner needs to be fired – and Paul Volcker needs to be named at Treasury secretary. Geithner is in way over his head and he’s threatening to pull Obama under the water, too
Oh please. Calling something a “distraction” is the WH way of saying they don’t want to deal with it. The buck stops at the Oval Office – no need for “empirical evidence.” Fire Geithner & Summers and get back to business.
Bush invaded the wrong country and won reelection.
This is a blip on the screen.
Yet this can be turned into an opportunity.
You want to know the fastest way to clean up the banking system.
It’s called INDICTMENTS.
I agree with Kathleen: this is a distraction like Natasha Richardson had a little fall and bumped her head.
The bonus issue encapsulates what’s going on with the bail out at large. Buying the socalled toxic assets for 100 cents on the dollar? Read the story about Cassano, the head of AIG Financial Products, barring the door against his accountant.
The public gets that the big banks are leading the administration, hence the taxpayers, around by the nose.
“Just give us the money and then go shut up and sit down.”
Liquidate and nationalize.
The AIG bonuses are annoying, but more importantly, I am furious that President Obama keeps hiring more mis-managers from Goldman Sacs and Citigroup. He is placing the foxes in the hen house under the theory that these foxes will know how to “fix” the economy. I have a hard time seeing them serving the needs of the taxpayers over the needs of their former masters at Goldman Sacs. I hate that all of these insiders have the authority to hand over huge sums of taxpayer dollars to Wall Street. Furthermore, Geithner has had his fingers on this mess ever since September 2008 when he was the head of the New York Fed. He is one of the architects of this bailout debacle and he has known all along about the bonuses and the misdeeds of AIG. He believes that AIG can not be allowed to fail and is willing to spend as many billions as it will take to keep them afloat. I can only hope his strategy will work — but I have significant doubts and concerns about his ties to Wall Street. I don’t think the man can think outside the box as his entire thought process is tainted with the viewpoint of Wall Street.
In the big scheme of things I think it is a distraction. Still, the public is getting an eyeful of how the other side of town lives and thinks. What pisses them off most is the sheer unmitigated effrontery of these Wall Street Royals who believe they are answerable to no one.
Geithner and Obama are dealing with a a two trillion, with a “T” dollar hole in the GDP (over two years). Seven trillion dollars of capital have gone *poof.” AIG paid out a few lousy hundred million in bonuses, many to people in the business units that are still profitable, that we need to stay profitable if we’re ever going to unload the company, and who had nothing to do with this mess.
Yeah, I’d call that a distraction. When they’re trying to keep the country from falling into an acutal depression, and do it despite the fact that the last bunch squandered what would have been eight years worth of surpluses and improved credit standing on wars of choice and tax cuts for the ******** who caused this mess, yeah, I’d call this a distraction. And if the measurement of “competence” at Treasury is now going to be based upon a failure to prevent P.R. debacles a) we’re screwed and, b) no one can meet even that standard because no way does a clusterfrak this big not throw off P.R. debacles like a grinder throws off sparks.
It is a distraction. This company lost 60 Billion dollars in 3 months late last year and we’re outraged that they paid out $165 Million to employees? We’re dead set on getting it back? What difference does it make if the American Taxpayers get $165 million dollars back when we’re already on the hook for more than 170 Billion to this company and have another 30 billion waiting in the wings. It is a distraction being played up for populist political gain. I agree that AIG shouldn’t be paying the money and the people getting it should be ashamed to cash the checks but in the overall situation this is a mole hill distracting everyone from the mountain looking over us.
loving, loving, loving the threads … I beg you all to keep it up …
Steve-you need to read up on this. The bonuses were for the most part paid to the London unit that got us into this mess-not people who are still useful to the company. And for Liddy to say they were “retention” payments is a flat out lie–did he not KNOW that 22 of the people who got these massive payouts had already left the company? This is not a distraction–it is the kicking off point for finding out what’s really going on. The same argument was made when Paulson started this whole mess–if we pressed him for details, the sky would fall.. there wasn’t time…blah blah blah–the same load of bs we get every time someone wants to look closely at the bailouts… let’s find out if the contracts themselves made under fraudulent circumstances; let’s find out if Liddy lied to us about these being “retention” payments; let’s find out if the derivative unit held AIG hostage–pay us or we will take the info with us–let’s find out if Geithner is lying about not knowing about the bonuses before we give him billions more for the toxic assets payout–if he is incompetent or determined to give his Wall Street friends a payout, let’s find out NOW. Let’s find out where Summer’s loyalties lie. Let’s find out who the unnamed WH staff person (Rahm Emmanuel?) was who told the NY Times that Dodd was responsible for taking out the salary cap when that is a flat out lie. Let’s find out why Goldman Sachs got AIG money when they stated that they were not facing any liabilities in this area. How can you go on trusting people if you don’t know the basic facts??? Do we want to wake up and find we’ve been fooled AGAIN? We are being lied to–it’s time to find out what’s really going on here, not acting like a bunch of drugged sheep.
One more thing–it’s now come out that Joseph Cassano–the head of that derivatives group- barred AIG’s chief accounatnt from looking at the books–gee, I wonder why. And the guy was given a misslion $ consulting position after they took him out of the unit! This is fraud–so where is the DOJ on this? If Obama is really serious baout chnaging this culture, why is he putting a leash on the DOJ? His behavior only makes sense if he is not really interested in upsetting the Wall Street apple cart–the obvious agenda of Geithner and Summers. So why should I trust him to hand out more of my money? We need all this explained pronto.
I’m putting on my rose-colored glasses. Did anyone catch Obama’s South Lawn press avail (chopper blades thumping, cue Ride of the Valkyries)? One reporter asked him how he was going to quell public anger. He said he doesn’t want to quell it, he wants to channel it into productive reforms, whatever. And I found myself thinking, are we having another rope-a-dope moment?
Personally, I’m thoroughly underwhelmed with the so-called “best and brightest” these guys keep yapping about. The fact that someone could even make the case that they “had” to retain this bunch is laughable at best and treasonous at worst. I’d spin off, then nationalize, the “Financial Products” division, then do to then what happens to the rest of us when hard times roll around: call a meeting, lay out how it’s going to be, and provide boxes for anyone not willing to go along with the program. We’re not seeing anything for our 80% stake – and that needs to change ASAP.
Mike is asking the critical questions…this is not a ‘distraction’…this is the tip of the iceberg…this is an example of the cozy, insider backscratching that goes on with Wall St and the powers that be…whether they are democrats or republicans…take a look at who got the most money in contributions from AIG…
…try taking some of your heads out of the sand and read what others are reporting
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/03/17/dodd/
firedoglake.com/2009/03/17/treasury-attempts-to-blame-dodd-for-aig-bonuses/
…and let’s stop with the nonsense that Obama and the White House did not know about the bonuses…they were articles written about this months ago and are traceable…are we supposed to believe convenient ‘untruths’?
…and who knows how much of this has already gone on, bonuses and waste of our money, with bailouts to others…and to put more salt on our wounds, for an admin that supposedly knows where every dime is going – how are they letting our taxpayer money go to foreign banks that are in turn using our taxpayer money to work against/hedging the US interests and housing crisis…you call that a distraction?
If this admin is going to work for the people then we must demand they do so…not just walk around in denial…
enough is enough…
“I haven’t exactly seen anybody come up with a different/better plan to handle the financial crisis.”
Who ought to? HE’S the secretary of the treasury! It’s his job. If he can’t do it, he should get the he** out of the way and let someone who can come in.
And what about the same payouts at FREDDIE MAC? Or is that protected as an arm of the liberal establishment?
They knew. Let’s move on and ask about the $62 Billion paid out to foreign banks now.
If you owe somebody money that you don’t have and come to me to borrow it and I attach a condition to it, it seems you have two choices:
1. Accept the money and the condition, or
2. Look elsewhere.
This assumes that I have the backbone to let you walk.
The reason that people are outraged about this is because it’s just plain sorry.
If Obama thinks the outrage over AIG’s bonuses (you know, the ones Chris Dodd specifically OKed) is a distraction, then why was he on TV today saying that people _should_ be angry about it?
And if his main priority is getting the financial system stabilized, wouldn’t he have managed to appoint more than one of the eighteen senior Treasury Department officials which require a Presidential appointment? He’s found time to throw lots of parties, which I don’t really mind, except that he _tells_ us there’s this massive crisis but then doesn’t _act_ like there’s a massive crisis.
Geithner needs to go, NOW.
Then that ***-clown Obama needs to go next.
Tsk.. tsk.. It was a great distraction from Obama’s tanking poll numbers, until of course it wasn’t.. that is when word came out that they knew of the bonuses beforehand.
Now they have to pretend that it (the bonuses) are such a big deal especially after a whole bunch of democrats voted today to let them keep the bonuses:http://republicanwhip.house.gov/blog/2009/03/house-democrats-vote-to-let-aig-keep-bonuses.html
This is most definitely a distraction and not one that was accidental. Over the past couple of week,s since the billion dollar payout for homeowners was announced there has been a meme circulating that Obama was awakening a populist backlash. There were articles by Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd, Jane Hamsher and others in addition to the idiot, Rick Santelli. And if you read anything written by Cenk Uygur over the past few days he is running with this story. Unfortunately, they have fallen neatly into a trap laid by the GOP led MSM and they are threatening to forestall any serious progress. This gunning for Geithner’s head leads me to believe that he is actually doing something right. When he was announced everyone heralded the pick and now he’s incompetent? I’m not buying it. If the problem was so easy to fix then it would be fixed by now. There is a whole host of people pretending to be Obama supporters that have attempted to undermine him, not just on this issue, but on his agenda. On the day that a group of conservative Democratic Senators announce the formation of a group to block the more progressive agenda of Obama, the left wing blogosphere is focusing on this non story. Not one news story has asked the question about the illegality of the US government abrogating contracts. I’m sure that everyone who has taken either con law or contracts knows that there is more to the story than is being reported. But by all means let’s rely on the labor contract canard as a way of refuting the existent law. I’m not disappointed in the wingnuts because I expect nothing less but it is less than thrilling reading comments by so-called progressives who may very well have lost the plot.
Also notice that a few weeks ago when the stock market was going down that every news show began with the numbers, yet when it started to rise or stabilize, the focus is no longer on the Dow. We can argue about the legitimacy of using the dow as a barometer for the health of the economy but isn’t it interesting that all discussion has ceased? Isn’t it also interesting that in the last couple of weeks when the press noticed that Obama’s poll numbers remain virtually unchanged that a controversy has been created? Also notice the silence of the MSM in discussing Cheney’s despicable interview with CNN coupled with the media scolding that Gibbs received over his “snarky” comments. Anyone who believes that the media is an impartial observer and are playing no role in the unfolding drama is delusional. Many of us turned away from the MSM for these very reasons and it is more than disheartening to visit progressive sites that have simply jumped on the bandwagon.
Yes hopee, pretender Obama supporters like Warren Buffet and Jim Cramer and Allahpundit of HotAir…
Sorry we got ‘em everywhere..
SUCK.
IT.
UP.
Distraction? So who indicated “outrage.” If it is a distraction it is a distraction that they focused the country’s attention on.
Perhaps it would have been less of a distraction if Dodd, Franks, and SecTreas hadn’t designed the loophole for the bonuses, in the first place.
I’m not so sure Rahm Emanuel is that smart. He’s good at bulldozing folks, but that play so well in national politics.
I would have thought a former Israeli soldier would have been more streetwise and practical.
Rahm Emanuel could run out of dead fish too..
This may be very important … it may but I don’t know. But I clicked on the link AN INTRIGUING GLIMPSE in this story so I could read about rahm’s exact quote and I get a story from the NY Times with zero information on it about rahm emanuel or what rahm emanuel said. Did you give me the right link or is rahm getting embarrassing quotes from him scrubbed from the NY Times?
IF … and of course I do not know … but IF they are scrubbing stories in the NY Times … the same damn newspaper that allowed Judith Miller to let the last administration anonymously whisper into her ear to perform propagandical stenography to market their damn war, then it is pretty fucked up that they are now scrubbing stories of embarrassing quotes from who is very likely the next administration’s “press whisperer”. It ought to be pretty damn embarrassing to the Times themselves if they are allowing themselves to be played like this again and take actions favorable to who is probably their newest reliable anonymous source or senior administration official or unnamed white house aide .. or latest unlabeled quota-matic machine.
Does anyone happen to have this article still up on their computer that you got from the link above? In a tab or anything? If you do, check to see if the article has the quote from rahm emanuel about when he said that obama saw this aig bonus situation as a distraction. And if so, check to see if it matches the same web address as this: (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/19/business/19bailout.html?hp). Then if you would, print it into a .pdf file … if you can, or just print it out on paper. Because in this article in the above link, it doesn’t have it in it … anymore?
I’d like to know if they are showing favoritism to who is likely their newest anonymous “press whisperer”.
Z
It was about 3:30 AM EST when I read the article
Z
Here’s a question for tone-deaf Rahm. When did HE find out about the bonuses?
There are people paying attention and there are a lot of people not paying attention. For people like us who are news crazy we pay attention. I would say more than half of the people aren’t and are just trying to survive everyday. To those folks, its’ business as usual in Washington and Wall Street. Should there be more outrage – probably but certainly the GOP and corporate media are controlling this story to try to make Obama look bad.
Most regular folks aren’t paying attention.
I am just amazed how many people here think they know so much about what’s going on. Face, it we don’t but for some reason we are enjoying talking about this until we are blue in the face
Is everyone really talking about it? Or is just everyone IN THE NEWS talking about it? Seems like headlines after headlines about public outcry only help perpetuate that as truth.
solving the AIG retention bonus fiasco is crucial to public support for more government interventions going forward. everyone i talk to knows about it and is angry about AIG people taking such handsome retention bonuses when they were the ones who drove the company off the cliff. the bonus payments may have legal standing in a contractual sense, but they have zero standing in a moral, ethical, or performance management, or political world. Pay people just for being there? Isn’t that illegal featherbedding?
this will not just taint the Obama Admin, it will cripple it if they don’t get this bonuses for financial destroyers thing right
Americans are very upset about AIG Bonuses. It’s time to stop the bonus bailout… Why do the republicans following Rush Limbaugh who says that the AIG CEO’s should get the bonuses. This is crazy.. Get behind your president, Obama call your congressman to get his budget through… its easy…Time for change . Its apparent that the Republicans are fighting every step of change… Republicans try to
overt the change that Obama stands for… Get behind our President…
Call Your State Congressman and Senators… Let’s get the Presidents Budget Passed
It’s not a distraction, it’s more evidence that Washington DC does not at all care how they spend the American people’s money, nor how much money they spend.
This recession will turn around eventually, whether there were any bailouts or not. The plan chosen by Senate Democrats and Bush which has been continued by Obama is to rape the tax payer to bring the banks that were on their death beds back to life.
The whole monetary system that the rich bankers pushed through under Woodrow Wilson is responsible for this mess.
Benjamin Franklin said one of the primary reasons for the Revolutionary War was to regain the right of the colonies to make their own currency rather than borrow it at interest from the Banks in England.
Under Woodrow Wilson we returned to that system of borrowing money at interest, ******** over future generations of work and save Americans with inflation.
The democrats had a chance to undo this system by not passing bailouts and waiting until Obama’s inevitable election. They didn’t. Take a guess why.
@ hopee
illegality of abrogating contracts? AIG would be bankrupt if the U.S. government had not stepped in. There wouldn’t be any contracts to abrogate.
Right or Left. When a Democrat is in office, most democrats demand support for the President. When a Republican is in office, most republicans demand support for the President.
Neither side realizes just how similar they are, similar in a bad way.
President Obama, whenever their are direct question to answer for who is responsible for our present crisis. Who did this? or Who did that? Mr. President who can always get your get out of jail card and say my vote is present, my vote is present, my vote is present. You would explain to the public that you voted present because the idea was not what I liked. So every one that took the risk where the ones ridiculed when a bad decision was made. Present, Present, Present…