Centrist Pundits

So, pretty much everybody who is alive is aware of the outrage coming from… well, pretty much everybody about the huge bonuses being paid out to AIG executives after being bailed out with our money.

There’s likely to be some serious political fallout. The most likely victim will be Connecticut’s Senator Chris D0dd, who put language into the stimulus bill that permitted these bonuses. Dodd has said that he did that at the request of the Obama administration. That may be, but next year when he runs for reelection, he’ll likely not be able to get past the fact that for the past 20 years, he’s been the top receipient of campaign contributions from AIG’s PAC.

But the most absurd thing is the attempt to rectify this by taxing the recipients of the bonus at rates that could only be described universally as confiscatory. Democrats are totally behind this… Republicans seem to be split.

The fact of the matter is that crafting tax policy to target a handful of individuals to cover up the government’s mistake is just plain wrong.

Now, don’t misunderstand me. AIG shouldn’t have given out these bonuses. It was a bad idea, although many of these were contractual obligations. But the fact is that the government let this happen. Some say the Democrats let this happen right under their nose. I don’t think that’s a fair characterization. It makes them seem like they were bamboozled, when the evidence is pretty clear that they were complicit partners in this.

I think that the GOP will, at the very least, pick up a Senate seat in CT because of this.

Greg Congress, Economy, National Politics, Political Parties AIG, bailout, bonus, Congress, finance, stimulus, taxes

With failing insurance giant AIG clamoring for more of our money, we keep hearing the same thing: that they’re “too big to fail.” We hear the same thing about the Big 3 automakers.

If these companies are too big to fail, aren’t they also too big to exist? Anti-trust laws are on the books to protect the marketplace from a successful company that gets too big. Shouldn’t it also protect the economy from a failing company that is too big?

Even as late as last year, GM and Ford were in merger talks. Doesn’t that make a bad situation worse? And this isn’t a problem aimed at any particular political party. These companies didn’t get to the size they are at now over the last few years. It took decades of growth and mergers to get to the point where they are “too big to fail.”

Greg Economy, National Politics AIG, anti-trust, auto makers, bailout, finance