Perhaps you’re frog-stomping mad about AIG bonuses. Guess what? You’re being played like a fool by your own government. Congress authorized those bonuses. Barack Obama has known about them for weeks. Indeed, according to Obama’s administration, they were last year’s news. This is all part of theater of the absurd, a massive distraction mean to divert your attention as a bipartisan bunch of clowns who aren’t reading the bills they’re signing and who haven’t read the U.S. Constitution since junior high chip away at the very foundations of this country.
What about Congress’ perks and bonuses? What about the pay raise they voted themselves this year? What about Washington’s complete and blatant disregard for tax laws that would get you or me audited in a heart beat? People who’ve been sucking off the government teat their entire adult lives and have the mathematical abilities of a brain-damaged monkey are trying to work you into a froth while they grab more power and more cash for themselves. They’re piling up massive debts as, under the guise of “stimulus,” they pass through every big government project that had been rejected over and over again for the last 40 years.*
Michael Goodwin, writing in the Daily News, says it best:
The very people, Republicans and Democrats alike, who can’t balance America’s budget now claim the expertise to run banks, insurance companies and automakers.
If we let them, we’re dumber than they are.
Note that a photo of Barney Frank runs with that piece. If any one member of Congress should be dragged out into the street along with execs at AIG for an old-fashioned beating, it’s him. Over and over again he declared nothing wrong with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Over and over again he resisted Bush administration (remember them?) moves for more oversight and regulation. And now he’s grandstanding? By the way, did you know that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac execs are getting bonuses as well?
As Goodwin writes, “The real outrage is that the bonuses represented a fraction of the $180 billion of public money pumped into AIG without any real oversight.”
Not coincidentally, AIG covered its bases pretty well during election season, spreading the cash around. But guess who the top two recipients of AIG cash were. Go on. Guess. Chris Dodd and Barack Obama. Funnily enough, both Dodd and Obama are blaming each other for inserting the language into the bailout bills that allowed AIG to honor its bonus contracts.
*Gripe all you want about defense spending. At least there I know my tax dollars are going to things that a) keep people employed; b) work as promised (those bombs and planes kill the shit out of people); and c) generally keep insane jihadists busy getting their asses killed in some other part of the world rather than in downtown Manhattan.
KEN WHEATON 
Seriously. Wow. I don’t even know where I stand on issues of government assistance now. All this top-down bullshit is driving me nuts. Remeber how we couldn’t trust these a-holes in the first place? Give US the money and let us decide, in a capitalistic fashion, which of our overhyped credit cards, mortgages, and student loans to pay off. Better yet — give us each enough money to pay them all off.
What’s the total government bailout up to now? Remember when we each received about $600 last summer? What would the money so far equal per tax-paying ADULT citizen (let’s say 250 million people to be safe)? Must be in the thousands…
Be careful, Jeff. You’re starting to sound like a libertarian … or a small-business owner.
They could have just suspended either payroll taxes or income taxes for one year — or, hell, six months. You know, just to see how THAT would stimulate the economy.
I think I remember seeing something about $18,000 per taxpayer which will–when all is said and done–balloon up to around $80,000 (but I might be wrong on that).
In addition, the administration is talking about using reconciliation to force legislation on taxation, health care, and energy through congress without needing the 60 votes (simple majority will do it) or without an opportunity for significant debate (20 hour maximum). So much for that spirit of bipartisanship we heard so much about.
All the spin worked with that global warming BS. So welcome to the USSA.
I was pretty close:
“In rough magnitude, right now we’ve got about $19,000 worth of public debt for everyone who lives in the U.S., and that will be roughly tripling for every person by 2019,” said Chris Edwards, director of Tax Policy Studies at the Cato Institute.