It brought tears to my eyes when I heard the bitter story about how Obama wants to slash the bonuses of the CEOs running TARP-funded companies. That Grey Poupon crowd has hired lobbyists to rally Americans around the idea that an evil socialist president is limiting their right to live the American "scheme."
The American "scheme," for most of those TARP CEOs and their staffs, was to steal trillions of dollars from America's pension programs. Organizations like CitiGroup, for example, used illusory financial instruments like derivatives and synthetics to move pension program money from your pocket to theirs.
To at least get a chuckle out of what probably happened to the value of your retirement plan during the "W" years, do this: Open the phonebook and randomly pick the name of a stockbroker or a bank president. Call that person and ask them to explain to you how a synthetic or a derivative actually works. Pin them down about details. Where does the instrument originate? How does it generate money? If you get the impression that they don't understand the intricacies of those financial instruments, it's not because they don't know their trade.
Even Alan Greenspan and the government deregulation fanatics he employed for eight years had no idea how those toxic instruments generated money for anyone besides the Wall Street bankers, and the investment houses that sold them. While Wall Street hustlers at places like CitiGroup, Bank of America, AIG, and JP Morgan were making more money than Bernie Madoff, America's pension programs and stock accounts were looted for 8 trillion dollars.
Along with all that looting, America lost 7 million jobs as a result of Greenspan's insistence on no regulations for Wall Street. And at the end of the banker and stockbroker greed frenzy, after America was broke, Greenspan testified in front of Congress. He had the appearance of damaged goods. He had helped his president lead America to the brink of an economic cataclysm. Greenspan had to admit in those hearings that his free market loony mentor Ayn Rand and he were finally exposed as fools. Greenspan admitted that we can't trust the Wall Street financial sector to police themselves in an unregulated market.
But today, those very people Greenspan said we can't trust are crying like four-year-old thumb-sucking babies who have had their "blankie" taken away. They are whining because Obama is cutting bonus and compensation packages by 50%. For example, that means that CitiGroup's CEO will only be allowed to pay himself $15 million. What's more incredible is that GOP leadership is whining right along with them as if Wall Street is the victim.
To further put those facts in perspective, you need to remember that taxpayers gave CitiGroup $50 billion under "W's" corporate welfare TARP program.
Predictably, the usual right wing lunatics are screaming that Obama's compensation cuts amount to "creeping socialism." But the truth is that most Americans believe that those TARP babies should have seen a perp walk and prison time. Wall Street once more proved that a man in an Armani suit carrying a brief case can steal a lot more than one man with a gun. Eight trillion dollars to be exact.