Has the AIG bonus scandal become Obama’s Katrina?

[poll id=”128″]

An Op-Ed in the New York Times is asking the question “has Obama’s Katrina moment arrived?”   They are referring to the AIG bonuses and the disastrous bailout of Wall St. and our banks.  We have seen in the past few weeks that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is not ready for prime time – nor are most of Obama’s economic team, including Larry Summers.  Their collective responses to the AIG bonus scandal have been legalese, not action.

Here are a few excerpts from the New York Times Op-Ed:

To get ahead of the anger, Obama must do what he has repeatedly promised but not always done: make everything about his economic policies transparent and hold every player accountable. His administration must start actually answering the questions that officials like Geithner and Summers routinely duck.

Inquiring Americans have the right to know why it took six months for us to learn (some of) what A.I.G. did with our money. We need to understand why some of that money was used to bail out foreign banks. And why Goldman, which declared that its potential losses with A.I.G. were “immaterial,” nonetheless got the largest-known A.I.G. handout of taxpayers’ cash ($12.9 billion) while also receiving a TARP bailout. We need to be told why retention bonuses went to some 50 bankers who not only were in the toxic A.I.G. unit but who left despite the “retention” jackpots. We must be told why taxpayers have so little control of the bailed-out financial institutions that we now own some or most of. And where are the M.R.I.’s from those “stress tests” the Treasury Department is giving those banks?

You would think that Obama should be considering booting the lame Geithner, but “embattled Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner’s job is safe and the subject of resignation has not come up in his conversations with President Obama despite calls from some in Congress for Geithner to step down, the president said in an interview to be broadcast tonight on CBS’s “60 Minutes,” according to the Washington Post.

I don’t know how most folks feel about this, but Geithner is starting to look like Obama’s Mike Brown.  You’re doing a great job Timmy!”  Barf…


About Admin

"Admin" is just editors Vern Nelson, Greg Diamond, or Ryan Cantor sharing something that they mostly didn't write themselves, but think you should see. Before December 2010, "Admin" may have been former blog owner Art Pedroza.