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Can I get an answer, please? By Michael C. Guilmette Jr. Originally published on March 26, 2009, in the Connersville News-Examiner. Last week, I watched in amazement as members of the governing class turned a typical contractual compensation obligation into one of the worst crimes of the 21st century.
When word of these bonuses hit the streets, we would have thought the AIG employees had been kidnapping children for sale in foreign lands. Andrew Cuomo, attorney general for the state of New York, demanded to know who received the bonuses. Not to be outdone, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., using tactics Joe McCarthy was often accused of using, not only demanded the names, he threatened to subpoena the company for the names and refused to guarantee the names would not be released, even though the AIG employees had been receiving death threats. Even President Barack Obama expressed his outrage at the news, saying during a campaign stop on Jay Leno’s late night talk show — the show he made his Special Olympics gaffe the media dutifully ignored or glossed over — he was “stunned.” For those who were troubled by the lack of attention paid to the president’s unfortunate remarks, you can rest assured that had President George W. Bush had said the same, he would have been crucified, so it evens out. But I digress. By last Friday, March 20, the new government-sanctioned CEO of AIG capitulated and released the names of the unfortunate employees, asking them to give the bonuses back, and the House of Representatives passed an unconstitutional bill taxing the bonuses at a rate of 90 percent. Continuing the pile-on, groups like ACORN, known for its links to voter registration fraud, and rent-a-mob groups like the Party for Socialism and Liberation began protesting AIG’s corporate offices and employee homes. Upon seeing all this, I glibly said to the rest of the newsroom staff that if we are ever offered bonuses, we shouldn’t accept them — otherwise, we could see ourselves dragged before Congress to explain our actions. Granted, I work for a newspaper — until the press version of the Fairness Doctrine shuts me down — and people generally do not go into journalism to get rich. But if a bonus were to come along, it would be nice to be able to accept it without getting grief from those who did not earn it. One of my co-workers quickly pointed out that the outrage — I hate that word; if I could ban it from political speech, I would — directed at AIG was because they foolishly accepted $182.5 billion in bailout funds. My first thought about the bonuses was, ‘So what?’ AIG is, or at least was, a private company, and private companies are allowed to set their own compensation standards. In fact, there used to be a day when, unless you were a shareholder in a company, it was none of your damn business what that company paid its employees. But then I’m reminded AIG took taxpayer money, and it could conceivably be argued said taxpayer money — less than 1/1,000th of it, anyway — is paying for those bonuses. Again, I say, ‘So what?’ Far more taxpayer has been wasted on far more “outrageous” things without the level of consternation the AIG bonuses have generated. It’s only been a handful of weeks since Congress passed the $410 billion spending bill laden with nearly 10,000 pet projects, yet rarely does someone seriously ask how many bridges to nowhere we should have our names on. It would seem to me that the philosophy is ‘If it comes from government, it is good.’ Our president certainly seems to believe that philosophy, since it is he who has said on many occasions that “only government” can fix this crisis, never mind that his administration is full of lobbyists and tax cheats. Obama’s tax cheat in the Treasury Department, Timothy Geithner, asked Congress on Thursday for the unprecedented power to seize practically any company, as the Associated Press put it, “whose collapse could imperil the entire economy.” This came on the heels of the New York Times report from last weekend saying the Obama administration is looking to provide oversight on executive salaries at a wide range of businesses — something that is only a pen stroke away from being “all salaries.” Each of these moves would be another step closer to a command economy, which is a hallmark of the dreaded “s” word — socialism — and even though Obama has repeatedly denied it, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck … Either way, it means a growing government, one more involved in all our lives. What is scary is that many people seem content with this prospect, even though government does not produce a single good or service that grows the economy. How is it, then, that so many people put so much trust in government? Government is the only organization that can legally confiscate a person’s money and property. Government is the only organization that can disparage a person’s rights. In fact, government is the only organization that can legally take a person’s very life, and yet many people still place an incredible amount of trust in it. I have heard the sophomoric notion that government represents the collective voice of the people, which is a crock, and the contrarian argument that government isn’t as bad as the business world, but none of those points have given me any insight into the visceral blind faith in an organization that is clearly working for itself. Can someone please explain this to me? I really would like to know. • Guilmette is managing editor of the News-Examiner. He may be contacted at mguilmette@newsexaminer.com. |
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Copyright © 2009, Michael C. Guilmette Jr. |
Last week, members of Congress and the Obama administration tore into American International Group, Inc. for handing out a total of $165 million in retention bonuses to hundreds of its employees — an action it was not only required to do, but one it was specifically allowed to do by a provision of the massive stimulus bill Congress passed last month.
