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Taxpayers Fund AIG Lawsuit Against US
AIG, now infamous for their executive bonuses, has decided that the $200 billion they received from the government is not nearly enough and is suing the government for the return of $306 million in tax payments. "AIG is effectively suing its majority owner, the government, which has an 80 percent stake and has poured nearly $200 billion into the insurer in a bid to avert its collapse and avoid troubling the global financial markets. The company is in effect asking for even more money, in the form of tax refunds. The suit also suggests that AIG. is spending taxpayer money to pursue its case, something it is legally entitled to do. Its initial claim was denied by the Internal Revenue Service last year."
Obama says "blame me", which is political-speak for "screw you, it's done, get over it". He won't be saying "blame me" when the honeymoon is over and this escalates to a full scale popular revolt.
We KNEW AIG were crooks long before we gave them this money. Why did they do it? Where the fuck was the outrage when these bailouts were first suggested? I've been outraged since the beginning, because the whole game plan has been obvious to me since they robbed us of that first $700B. And yet polls suggest that Americans STILL think this is going to work somehow.
These people: the Congress, the President, AIG, are all just a bunch of god damned frat boys, scratching each other's backs and doling out our tax money to each other in such staggering volumes that it WILL be the end of this country if we don't stop right now.
Did you all catch Chris Dodd saying he had nothing to do with the change in the bailout legislation to allow these bonuses, then the next day saying oops, that was me. "Somebody should have caught it sooner" - yeah, right, if the bill had any chance of being reviewed by the legislators themselves, let alone the public, before if slipped past Obama's desk quicker than a greased turd. What happened to those 5 days, huh?
Seriously people, at what point do we get off the couch and take back this country? Obama can stimulate my ass.
Whether they are spending money directly from the bailout or spending capital they already had (and thus spending bailout money elsewhere), the tax payers are funding it.
Whale
May I suggest the "GTFO" tag?
Today's XKCD seems particularly relevant. There's bigger things to worry about right now. This is a silly distraction -- like the whole "earmarks" thing.
What as stupid article!!
The US government, although the largest shareholder is not the ONLY shareholder. Minority shareholders have rights and a successful lawsuit benefits them too.
I wish people would give their heads a shake!
Are these guys intentionally trying to force Congress to shut them down? Too much more of this, and economy or no economy, lawmakers are just going to say "Fuck you, die die die" and let the international banking system take a nosedive.
I have been (somewhat) onside for giving Wall Street a helping hand, but between the sheer incompetence of the Democrats and the sense of entitlement of these guys, I think it's time to say "Screw it", let them all sink, and then rebuild it properly, with laws requiring all bonuses be voted on by shareholders, all executives and managers be forced to convert their stock to non-voting, requiring complete replacement of any company's board and senior executives the second they take a single penny of taxpayer money, and putting their legal departments under direct Treasury control.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Tru-Value states there has been a run on pitchforks.
I'm not in finance, but this half-ass measure of injecting money into AIG seems, well, half-assed. We should either have let it fall, or nationalize it outright and sell it off piece-meal (or whole). Grab a (semi)patriotic Gordon Gecko and put him to work - we don't lack Gordon Geckos, do we?
Maybe?
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
There was a great article in Rolling Stone today that lays out exactly what has happened at AIG in terms most people can understand. It makes my blood boil!
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
First the bonus payments and now this. Do these people think that taxpayer money grows on trees?
This space left intentionally blank.
no good deed goes unpunished....or in this case, no bad deed isn't followed by more bad deeds.
I wonder if it's a bit too late to do a "stop payment" on that 200 billion dollar check...(not to say that the majority of the big banks can afford even that).
The income tax system has become so complex with so many loop holes the not even the Treasury Secretary could master it. The problem of tax loss selling in particular is set to explode. Time to replace it with something much simpler like Fair Tax.
AID has mastered bad press. If it were really true that "no press is bad press" then they have gotten a bargain. No way they could buy this coverage for a few $100 Million. All I have heard this week is AIG this and AIG that.
Sad thing is I think this is one time when bad press is REALLY bad.
Think Deeply.
If there has ever been a time for a corporate death penalty, it's right the fuck now.
There is a war going on for your mind.
They are as politically biased as anyone.
What's happening now is that AIG is basically a way for the USA to shovel money into foreign banks.
We should set a new rule. When a company asks for .gov money to be bailed out, the top 5 layers of the company should be fired. No exceptions.
This is just beyond belief.
It shouldn't be. I was just thinking earlier that I was glad that media storms like AIG blow over slashdot, and I can get different news here then the stuff everyone else is talking about.
This has absolutely nothing to do with tech or nerdiness, and in the grand scheme of things, it isn't that important. I can see no redeeming value, and I hope in the future that /. manages to avoid being run over by "big" stories like this.
Say that as you're getting your pink slip.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Really, this all boils down to a physics problem. If we could see what would have actually happened had AIG been allowed to fail, we could either just let them fail, or point out how horribly terrible that world would be. As it is, we get to experience all this fun.
The real fun begins when someone makes a clear statement of where the billions went. As it is, AIG benefits from attention getting focused on a million here and a million there (it doesn't make the millions any less galling, but damn it, they are tiny problems compared to the rest of the money involved).
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
It's Stuff That Matters. I would presume that most of the people here to pay taxes, so I would presume they have a vested interest.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
If the government is the majority shareholder, can't they vote to stop the lawsuit?
It sounds as if the government is suing itself!
Beny
"I'm a humble person really,
I'm actually much greater than I think I am"
News for nerds. Stuff that matters.
Slashdot have a relatively behaved and intelligent average poster (at least compared to most other public forums); and this is a subject of great personal interest. Further more the forum structure maintained by Slashdot is good at ensuring the debate not get filled with rubbish (much). So all in all I say I find these types of "non-tech" news refreshing and stimulating. :)
The Long Now Foundation
Enough ... more than enough. The viperous "financial" industry needs an example. Time to apply ROMAN JUSTICE to AIG management and BOD .
0) strip them bare of all property
1) flog them 'round-the-street
3) decimate those surviving
3) sell wives and daughters to Saudi whorehouses
Thus done, it will take another 50-y for a new crop of vipers to mature.
That's essentially what is happening. The holders of AIGs debts are the real beneficiaries of the bailout. Instead of bankruptcy where they would fight for the scraps of the carcass, they are receiving 100% payoffs, some from the bailout dollars, and some from the ongoing liquidation of AIG assets.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Perhaps we should discuss rising income inequality in the US? Or the wars in Darfur? Lots of stuff is worth discussing, but I think having some focus on forums tends to make them a bit better.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Don't blame AIG for trying to get their tax money back (perhaps the only money here that is rightfully theirs), or for paying their employees what is contractually due to them. Blame our politicians for bailing them out instead of allowing their failure.
OMG I am sick to death of hearing about this stupid company. Ok for you rabid anti capitalists out there, here's facts:
1) The executive bonuses were contractual obligations made by AIG to the employees long before any talk of a bailout started.
2) Government infusion of cash does not nullify pay contracts previously and privately made between employer and employee.
3) Even if an agreement between AIG Accountants and US Treasury officials could retroactively nullify the bonus agreements, it was never stipulated as a condition of the bailout.
How would you feel if you made an agreement to work for company A for a salary of X provided you were eligible for a bonus each year of Y if you performed L,M and N. Then you performed L, M and N and were told by yer boss, "Hey I'm sorry. We can't pay you the bonus we agreed on because the government thinks its too much" or "We need ed money so we took a loan from the government and part of our agreement with the government was that you would forfeit your bonus."
If I were told the above, my next phone call would be my attorney and I would bring a suit against Company A for breach of contract.
We as citizens should be at torch and pitchfork mindset over the government inserting its own judgment on private employment contracts rather than how much AIG pays its executives. If you don't want tax dollars to fund AIG's contractual employment obligations, DON'T GIVE LET THE GOVERNMENT GIVE THEM OUR MONEY. When they go belly up, the executives won't get paid and we can all be happy and get on with our lives.
Sounds like a classic case of the Aesop: The Farmer and the Snake.
During the fridge winter months, a farmer happened upon a snake frozen upon his grounds. Taking pity on the creature, he took it into his home to warm it by the fireside. Perhaps he realized they eat the rodents who would dig up his crops, and thus provided a dire function. Perhaps it was just the plain goodness in his heart. As the snake warmed itself and became animate, it leapt to forth and bit the farmer. As the farmer lay in pain (perhaps poisoned) he cried out, "Why have you bitten me, snake?!" I do believe the obvious answer was "Duh, I'm a snake."
Demented But Determined.
Err hello, yes AIG is largely owned by the Govt, but does that mean it now must STOP being a responsible company?
If you worked for the IRS and your accountants told you that you the IRS owed you $10k on your tax refund would you stop and say, "oh no I couldn't claim that?" of course not, and you shouldn't! That is why we have tax refunds. I'm not saying that this AIG case is a similar refund case but the principle applies.
Yes I know everyone is pissed off about the bonuses (In particular imagine all those mom and pops who lost tens of thousands from their retirement funds for example!), but a bail-out like this does not *yet* equal socialism! Hopefully one day everyone will calm down a bit and remember that.
I hardly consider hundreds of millions of lost dollars to be "distractions." They are smoking guns in the middle of a warzone. Men are being murdered, but since there is death everywhere, there is no crime being committed? Wrong. Sloshing their poison in with the water does not make any of it right. Politicians and CEOs are stealing hundreds of millions of dollars and they are not in prison right now. If I stole half a million from a bank, I'd be in irons. These men should be locked up for life, not simply laughed about and told "no no!" because their horrific (yes, "HORRIFIC") crimes against our society are drown out in as much noise as they can muster around it.
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
I'm with parent. If I had mod points, the "flamebait" mods would be flowing like water...
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Mathwise, u r right that 100 million is a minor distraction. However, you miss the big picture. The economic mess was caused not by lazy americans maxing on the credit card, but the cowboy behaviour (if not crimminal)of aig execs (and their counterparts at other financial firms)
what will help the economy is to change this culture, and part of that is changing the compensation culture on wall street ; the point is that the bonus are undeserved and un necessary (these guys wanna walk, go for it - lots of unemployed people we can pickup cheaP) and that the bonuses are part of this culture.
Based on nothing more than this rant, you've made yourself a friend and fan today. Let's call it a movement, nay, a revolution!
Nope, I'm not joking.
How are you going to support tech, without the money tied up in these banks? When these companies went belly-up, so did the stocks of IBM(tech), Dell(tech), Cisco(tech)... Tech can't innovate without investment; and there can't be investment without money. Also, many IT's have lost their jobs, or suffered cuts in salary, due to this mess and the fact that their tech companies' investments were wrapped up in this debacle. This problem is so huge, you could talk about it on epicurious.com and be justified.
Because a bunch of slashdotters are wondering why they can't buy any new tech at work (if they have a job still) or at home. No money, No Job, No Tech.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Because we desperately need something to fill the time between now and the BSG finale.
http://www.breitbart.tv/html/301543.html
Dishonest doesn't even begin to adequately label the President and Congress. We know have a group in Washington who not only has no problem inciting mob rule, violence even (there are people stalking AIG employees who are not even executives.. let alone responsible), and getting away with it. All Americans should be very afraid of our own law makers, for if you become a political liability, you fall out of favor with the political class, they will use the power of law to take your property. They will use their power to get free exposure in the press and on tv and goad other's to harass you , shame you, and hate you.
We have a US President going on a comedy show and disingenuously declaring shock over an event he knew was coming. Geitner was quizzed in public (look it up on cspan) panel discussions in Congress by a Democrat!
Yeah, Bush was annoying, but these guys just went beyond the pale. They are inciting people. Worse the President is joining in. All against people who broke now law, people who were LAWFULLY owed the money. People who Congressmen who by signing the stimulus bill declared were legally owed the money!
WTF?
AIG is just the vehicle that these guys are using to trounce all our rights. We now have a political class who shows no fear of abusing the power vested in them to threaten, cajole, and steal, from those who they think they can get away with.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
If you are a poor slob with a gun in Afghanistan you get sent to Gitmo for years without any trial, isolation, and torture. If you are an executive with a sleazy company that helps destroy the entire economy, costs taxpayers billions of dollars, and continues to do so you get...nothing.
God bless America!!!
First of all, it looks like it's happening anyway so saving AIG isn't worth it.
Second, AIG was to protect the mortgage originators from the borrowers defaulting. Well, that's happened. And instead of the mortgage originators taking the loss, AIG is. In other words, the systemic losses are being concentrated at AIG. What I'm saying is that letting AIG go bankrupt wouldn't harm the system. The losses would just be spread over the system and individual banks and partners would be taking the hit. It's a zero sum game right now. AIG is irrelevant; except for the bonus that tis executives say they deserve. I say let'em die. It will have no net effect on the economy. The damage is done.
They weren't bonuses - they were retention contracts. AIG didn't want everyone to jump ship so they offered retention contracts to key people. It's a VERY normal thing to do. The dollar amount may have been crazy - but they were NOT bonuses.
-Tolerate my intolerance
I'm curious how damage is being done to the company in loss of good will. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if the outrage caused by this lawsuit alone didn't cost them much more than $300M. I'm not sure whether the whole fiasco will cost them more than $200B, probably not, but I know many people who won't do business with AIG ever again if they can help it. Sometimes money grubbing is a bad business move.
While we're hounding execs outside their homes over AIG bonuses, I'd like to know if AIG will still be permitted to fill campaign coffers? I know I'm supposed to be apoplectic with rage over these now taxpayer funded bonus payouts (Great Leader and Co. have been telling me so for a week now,) but shouldn't I also be outraged if AIG, using bailout money in part, continues funding Dodd's future election campaign(s)?
After we gut all the executives personal bank accounts we can go about gutting the accounts of everyone AIG paid off. Bonuses are just the beginning of this.
Sure, it may be the tip of an iceberg, but if we apply enough termite to that tip, we can melt the whole goddamn thing.
Mark Herr, an A.I.G. spokesman, said Thursday that âoeA.I.G. is taking this action to ensure that it is not required to pay more than its fair share of taxes.â
HAHAHAHAHA...wait what? You're not laughing Mark...You can't possibly be serious I mean...taxes...AIG..."fair share"...I mean, who does your comedic writing? They are GOOD.
Honestly, how did *anyone* not see this coming? For anyone that thought that the bailout was a good idea (and by anyone I mean anyone, regardless of political party or leanings), you're getting what you deserved. Unfortunately you're dragging the rest of us with you. What did anyone expect to happen? We took businesses with a *proven* failed operating plan, and gave them more money to "keep on keepin' on." We rewarded bad decisions and then all of a sudden, the still operating failure of a business (surprise!) keeps on making bad decisions and burning through capital faster than it takes it in. I know this is a logical fallacy, but damn! you had to be stupid to not see this coming. Anymore I just chuckle at the absurdity of this whole situation... we're getting what we asked for. I can't blame AIG for this, it is doing exactly what it has been doing-- f*ing up. But when we give them free money to keep on doing it, you can't blame them for thinking it might actually be good business.
So the gov't calls a shareholder meeting, replaces the board, and the new board quashes the lawsuit. They own 80% of the equity in the company. The government can do whatever it wants with AIG because it owns them.
Why is this lawsuit a big deal? Or rather, why does it still exist?
Advice: on VPS providers
to be followed by a complete lack of action.
They are robbing us blind because they know we won't do anything till we're starving. At that point, they can just take the money and run.
Holy shit can't believe you got modded troll.
"President Obama said Wednesday he'll "take responsibility" for AIG executives receiving controversial bonuses while the company took $173 billion in government bailouts."
I'm sure that since he has taken responsibility for the bonuses, Obama will personally repay the American taxpayer the $160+ million dollars.
Oh wait, this more like that other type of responsibility that Rumsfeld took for the crimes committed at Abu Ghraib, where the guy responsible doesn't face any consequences. Rumsfeld didn't do jail time for Abu Ghraib, low level soldiers did.
A *normal* bear market loses 50% of the prior rallies gains. In a normal bear market we would have fallen from 14,000 to 7,000.
You can see the downward momentum is draining out on the long term charts.
The ultimate bottom is about 4500.
People will talk very darkly but it will happen and then we'll start a long term uptrend. There have been many financial panics before.
However- we can JUST as easily take away these bastards bonuses as they are taking away our pensions and the unions contracts. The fact is AIG was bankrupt.
I think the way they are doing it is unconstitutional- we'll see. A better way would be the mind numbingly through IRS baseline audits with maximum fines for every place where their taxes were incorrectly paid. And a promise to continue those audits on an annual basis for the next 6 years unless 75% of the money was turned down.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Slashdot isn't a tech site, even though that's its origin and a key focus still. It's a nerd site, which includes science, and finance and economics is a form of nerdery all its own.
Seriously, if you want a site that's focused on just tech, Ars Technica is much better than Slashdot. But Slashdot is a more well-rounded geek site.
... does this have to do with my rights online?
If they wanted to , the US gov. could still pass it to a vote amongst the shareholders and being that the US now holds something like 75% of the votes, could vote against the lawsuit and kill this before it starts.
AIG and the other "too big to fail" guys really do have the country by the nuts. We need at least some of these dickheads to stay in their jobs to clean up their own human waste.
However, why not draft them into the army? Or the Marines. Yeah, the Marines would be good.
Pay them military salaries appropriate to their grade and throw them in a Navy Brig if they leave their jobs.
As an OS-10, General Petreus gets about $180,000 a year. If they want bonuses, let them spend their annual vacation in Afghanistan, get some combat pay.
I mean at what point to you say this turd is cooked? Move them to bankruptcy court already.
Jail time is an important managment tool for issues like this one. Whoemever at AIG initiated this this suit against the US government and by extension the American public needs to go directly to jail. The F*cking unbelievable nerve it takes crooks like this to pull this kind of crap is hard to fathom, they do it I suppose because they've gotten away with sh*t like this for years. Hopefully Congress will force the judiciary to put a stop to this and sic the justice department on whomever at AIG is responsible, probably the same icehole who agreed to the zillion dollar bonus lunacy.
A 26-year marine corps staff sergeant gets $32,515.20 annually (plus all he can eat). That sounds about right.
There's a known solution to this problem. In the 1980s S&L collapse, the Office of Thrift Supervision established the rule that S&Ls taken over by the Government couldn't sue each other or the Government. It just burned up legal fees, since the money came out of the same pocket. Congress needs to enact something like that this time.
I believe it was Bush who created the bank bailout. Now I don't like the bailout ether way but you can't blame Obama for something that was already law before he became president. You can however point fingers at him all you want over the second bail out, but that one wasn't for the banks aka AIG.
Wouldn't it be cool if us regular people could sue to get our taxes back.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
If the US government owns 80% of the company don't they have some control? Can't they tell the CEO to drop the lawsuit and if he refuses just replace him with someone who will?
Can we please just execute those boozes for treason or being criminally stupid? Please? Heck, at this point, I'm in favor of rounding up every one of their board and share holders that voted for this had beheading them and mounting them on sharp stakes right in front of wall street.
Can you tell that I'm just mildly upset?
Seriously, if you have a sick and injured animal, you try to help it recover. But if that animal is deemed unfit to coexist with people and other animals... like food aggression, attacking people, or literally biting the hand that feeds it...
Well, that animal needs to be put to sleep.
It's irrelevant what the $$ amount is, if the sole purpose of the company now is to keep sucking money into it's expenditure hole and apparently tossing back up this kind of behaviour.
Even if the company survives the economic issues we're living in, would the company itself be viable as a service company, given the kind of image/pr suicide it's been committing?
Forget about too big to fail. Let's start looking at companies that are too tained/corrupted to be allowed to succeed.
Winged Power Photography
Cluestick: beside the fact that the bonuses are peanuts compared to the bailout, beside the fact that the bonuses were added *back* into the bailout by Congress, beside the fact that the bonuses are probably required by the employment contracts... the heart of the matter remains that AIG should never have been bailed out!
Do you think that these bonuses act as a reward for their management's bad behavior? Then what the fsck do you think the BILLIONS of bailouts are? It's a big giant signal to the financial market that no matter how big of a mess you make, the taxpayers will still bail you out. It's called "moral hazard", when markets have a disincentive to reduce risky behavior. We had a mild climate of moral hazard before the crash, but the bailout has pushed it over the top and into absurd extremes. The mismanagement of AIG has was not met with a market rejection, but with a huge 200 BILLION government reward.
When you praise your dog for shitting on the rug, don't be surprised that he keeps shitting on it.
We shouldn't be angry at AIG, they are only doing what we have trained them to do. We should be angry at our congressmen and past/current presidents for wasting 200,000,000,000 on tawdry corporate whore.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
Majority owners can't actually do "whatever they want" unless they actually own 100% of the company. The trouble here is that the 20% minority owners are something of an annoying fiction--- the company is by rights bankrupt and the shares worthless, but the government has unwound this mess somewhat ineptly and as a result on paper the company still exists and has value, and 20% of that value is owned in the private sector by people who technically the company has a fiduciary duty to.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
It's just like the story of the grasshopper and the octopus.
All year long, the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter, while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV.
But then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns. Also, he got a race car.
Is any of this getting through to you?
The 1929 stock market peak wasn't reached again until about 1955, and a consistent upwards trend didn't even start until 1942.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Basicly, letting AIG fail would not just crash the American economy. It would crash the world economy. As in NO MONEY IN THE ATM crash. As in NO FUEL FOR YOUR CAR crash. It might cost billions, but the alternative is far worse. Think Zimbawe. They have been allowed to grow too large to fail, and there is no way out of it except to keep them alive until they can be split up and sold.
Actually. You set up a National Commercial Bank, wholly owned by the government, not the FED. Then you let all the fucked up banks fail. All insured funds/accounts are transferred to the NCB when a bank collapses. You let the creditors fight over whatever assets the banks had.
The credit supply to the economy continues under the NCB. The fucked up banks fail as they should. Everyone is happy.
Deleted
If the gubmint is the majority owner, and there is a duty to act in the best interest of shareholders, how the hell can AIG sue the government? They are suing themselves!
...
... .....
You know, I'm the last person in the World you'd expect to expect feel anything decent about a corporation. I'm a communist, think all big business owners should be thrown in jail (well, besides than the fact that I'd like to see all jails abolished, but that's another matter), have zero respect for Obama's cruise missile liberalism - or liberalism in general...
But Jesus Fucking Christ. Even Bill Gates gives money to African charities so he can believe he's going to heaven. Even auto company executives tell themselves they'll ultimately helping the economy by laying off thousands of workers. Even those who don't actually give even a theoretical shit about others pretend to for PR reasons.
"What the fuck?" is all I can say.
Property is theft.
And without a resolution to the current political crisis in Pakistan, Pakistanis won't be able to get their tech industry going again. Nearly everything is related if you really stretch.
I'm not saying these things aren't worth discussing, just that it isn't really Slashdot's core competence. I participate at multiple discussion forums for precisely the reason that I do find many things valuable to discuss. But I don't really debate AIG bailouts at Slashdot, and I don't really debate the merits of OpenOffice at DailyKos.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Perhaps someone can sue Congress and the President for becoming too harmful to the middle and lower classes using the Declaration of Independence, the idea that people should stand up to an abusive government, as well as the Constitution of the United States, mainly use the preamble and show that their policies do not follow it or are only protecting one group and not all people; after all people have sued the US Government before. The problem is what to do for a resolution that will keep things running correctly when correctly is viewed differently by different people. Perhaps use the preamble as a bases for all law? What group, not individual, should try this approach instead of allowing the country to fall apart or worse another civil war.
Something to discuss at least.
We need to get the Federal Reserve under control.
For all the claims of wanting a more transparent government this is the best place to start. Hell the thing isn't even transparent or mostly answerable to Congress.
The fact remains hundreds, if not thousands, of American banks are fine. Better yet it the position of America's credit unions - who by the way are going to be ruined if Congress gets its way because they are trying to force the same loan rules on them that got banks into trouble. Essentially forcing them into making bad loans so as not to be declared discriminatory. Sorry, I want my credit union to discriminate against those who cannot financially uphold their end of the deal. People should not get a pass of responsibility just because they are politically favored class.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Honestly, I'd go more for embezzlement here. Willful misappropriation of funds and all that. Fine them at least the money that would have been paid out as bonuses, or just fine them their entire share of the stimulus package and let them rot.
I think it would be a lot better than the current idea of abusing the government's power to tax. This would at least allow some due process, and without creating an incredibly dangerous precedent that would effectively allow arbitrary taxation for just about any purpose.
Sounds like someone needs a waterboard...
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
Failures on the part of our politicians do not constitute a justification for evil on the part of AIG.
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Perhaps I don't understand what "ownership" means. If I "own" an 80% share in a gas station, and the gas station is suing someone, I have the right to call up the station and say "drop the lawsuit, and fire whoever thought of the lawsuit". By the same logic, a representative of the Federal government should be able to personally order the person who is responsible for this suit fired immediately.
By a similar reasoning, if I own 80% of the business, and there is some question over whether an employee is owed a large bonus, as owner I can say "nope, don't pay the bonus". Even if my order violates a written contract, the employee would have to sue to get their money. And there's unlikely to be a single jury in the United States that would allow AIG execs to collect a few million dollars in return for making financial decisions that have destroyed the savings of millions of people.
Looks like the only change you folks are getting is whatever metal is left in your pockets.
frag the fsckers.
There at least some public debate about the 700 billion.
How about the 9.7 trillion? 9.7 trillion is a lot bigger than 700 billion.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&refer=home&sid=aGq2B3XeGKok
Only the stimulus bill to be approved this week, the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program passed four months ago and $168 billion in tax cuts and rebates enacted in 2008 have been voted on by lawmakers. The remaining $8 trillion is in lending programs and guarantees, almost all under the Fed and FDIC. Recipients' names have not been disclosed.
Here everyone, look at the wookie's little friend. Oh you'd rather look at the wookie? That's OK too!
While some CDS purchasers were buying CDS contracts on their business partners, many more were buying CDS contracts on unrelated companies purely as a derivative instrument to hedge against change in market valuations.
As this explained in this wonderful quote from a webpage http://thismatter.com/money/insurance/insurable-interest.htm/ explaining why you can't buy life/fire/etc. insurance on a person or piece of property in which you do not have an insurable interest, "The main purpose of buying insurance is to compensate for lossesâ"the insured's losses. To allow someone to be compensated for a loss that does not affect them financially would create a moral hazard. ... Without an insurable interest, buying insurance would be gamblingâ"paying premiums in the hope of making a profit, which is not only against public policy, but also against the purpose of insurance"
In any form of insurance *EXCEPT CDS* it is straight out illegal to take out insurance on a party in whom you do not have an insurable interest (it might have been illegal for CDS's as well if they can be determined to have been an insurance policy but the AGs are ignoring that).
If CDS insurance had also required an insurable interest to purchase, the CDS market would have only been something like a quarter of the level it was allowed to grow to http://blogs.ft.com/maverecon/2009/03/should-you-be-able-to-sell-what-you-do-not-own/ (which would have saved the U.S. taxpayer a lot in AIG losses!!).
Don't just parrot talking points from the cheerleader talking heads on CNBC (and I include Jim Cramer in that category) -- make an effort to actually understand the stuff before you spout off.
8,200,000,000 * 80 = 656,000,000,000
That is the current cost of the Iraq war. Yeah, let's talk about the "outrage du jour", shall we? IMO, while possibly an ill conceived plan, this has a goal and a purpose. And hundereds of thousands of people won't be killed or injured because of it.
And they aren't funding this with taxpayer money, they are just printing up more money to pay it off. Just like they are doing with the Iraq war. This isn't our money, it's our grandkids' money.. and their grandkids' money.
This administration is telling us what is going on, for the most part - and we don't like it. Hey, they're all going to screw us, but what would you rather have - one that lies to you and treats you like children, keeping you scared of the monsters under the bed?
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
The shares that the government bought are all non-voting shares. So while the government can reap the benefit if the company's share price ever recovers, they have absolutely no say in how the company is run.
Maybe its time as a nation we as a people speak out. AIG is screwing us, Big Corps are screwing us. Hell our government screwed us for the last 2 terms of office. Maybe as a people we should just screw them back. I don't know where we went wrong as a country. We used to be the crown prince of the Earth. All nations looked to us and then we allowed an idiot from texas who ruled us. He took away our rights and idiot zealots thanked him for it. No more Due Process, No more Privacy, Screening our calls, Then demanding access to our e-mails and our internet searches. Thank god companies fought back but my god. We lost so much diplomatic ground. and these same idiots past bills and left the new president cleaning up an old mess. We have a war no one wants any part of. The republicans consistantly blame the democrats for Republican Failures. I used to be proud to be an American. If I traveled abroad on business I smiled and didn't I spoke about it. I hope Obama will make me proud again. I hope the Republican party falls. I hope someone blows up AIG. I hope Fox News Burns to the ground and I hope Rush Limbaugh catches an STD and suffers till death, and if he infects Sarah Palin SO BE IT! 300 years ago there was a dream about a country that gave people self evident rights. I hope in my lifetime I will see that dream return to a reality.
Employees and Executives at my company have gone without bonuses this year, despite many of us "earning" them. We're not anywhere near in trouble (30%+ margins), and the executives decided to eliminate bonuses rather than cut pay, which actually means bigger pay cuts for executives than the "little people". And we're having the least turnover in the last 8 years. If we can do that as a profitable company, AIG damn well better be able to do it as a failed company.
All of the reasons AIG has given for paying out these bonuses is bullshit by corrupt executives in a corrupt industry propped up by a corrupt treasury and regulatory bodies.
I am betting the insurance companies will pay me if my house burns down.
The insurance companion are betting that only a marginal few will burn down, and the rest will cover expenses and a profit.
It all goes to hell when all the houses burn down.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The thing that confuses me is directors get golden parachutes even when they're kicked out by the shareholders. The rationale is they have a contract for services and there is a contractual obligation to buy them out of it.
Myself and my employer also have a contract for service which gives each other rights and obligations. If I was let go, I would have a month notice.
The problem is the information and power gap between directors and shareholders. Shareholders approve directors and their remuneration but it's a token vote really, it has to be not only absurd but unusually absurd for shareholders to actually vote down a remuneration package. Even if you have your company who is good at this, with strong non-executive directors and so on, they fall into the trap because if you want to attract a good director you have to pay the same or better than all the companies where the shareholders are suckers.
This leaves you with a situation that new directors can negotiate remuneration before their performance can be evaluated, before the shareholders have much reason to be paying attention. Thus they simply lock themselves into a cant-lose package before anyone starts to care. It even becomes a perverse incentive to the shareholders, who become even more reluctant to dismiss a director because it costs so much money to buy them out.
Here in the UK we've had various reports on the situation over the years but IMHO one thing which would make a massive difference is to legally mandate that if shareholders vote out a director the dismissal overrides any contract leaving the director due an average 1 month's salary plus any accrued bonuses.
Gee, I guess I've jumped on this party a bit late, but, do you have a steady job . . . have you paid your taxes . . . and provided for your family . . . not delinquent on your mortgage ?
Give yourself a bonus. Deduct it from your income.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
They were bonuses... retention bonuses. I don't care how you wrap them up, they were bonuses. Any other term is just an attempt to hide their true intent.
Bonuses to keep people on so they... don't go somewhere else? Number one, where would they go? Number two, maybe if they screwed up this company that bad, they SHOULD go somewhere else? If I were a shareholder and they just fucked up the company with credit default swaps, I wouldn't want them working there.
And no one really called bullshit on this before?
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
A new entity (the government) came in which is not bound by those contracts
When you buy or assume ownership of a company, what makes you think you can just ignore contracts already put in place? AIG has not filed bankruptcy. AIG was "nationalized" to the tune of 80%. In other words, the government seized 80% ownership - but make no mistake, it is still a (dis)functioning corporation with a corporate charter and everything. It is still bound by SEC rules for filing financial statements. Etc, etc. Your insinuation that they are not bound to those contract terms is just plain wrong because the legal structure of AIG has not changed at all. The only difference now is that your government (you and I) own 80% of it. It was an ownership change.
If AIG had declared bankruptcy and the government bought it THEN you would be right. You see, this is exactly what bankruptcy is all about -- wiping out past debts and contracts. But until you go through that process, everything is still in effect (and should rightfully be).
AIG, without question, is bound to these contracts. If the government unilaterally overrules that, then heaven help us all. We will scare away any and all investors because who the hell wants to do business in a banana republic that can unilaterally change contracts just because the political winds change. Chavez and Morales do that kind of thing, not Americans.
The real outrage here should be that these people get retention bonuses when most of us on slashdot get presented with non-compete clauses.
People ARE starting to notice. (I still think such discussions should standardize on millions of dollars, for example: $165M vs $173,000M.)
Here's a visual: http://minnesotansforglobalwarming.com/m4gw/2009/03/aig-and-the-new-math.html
Ok, if the tax laws say they should get this refund, and they aren't getting it, they have a right to petition in court to force the issue.
And if the bailout law specifies exact amounts they are getting, well, they have a legal right to those amounts in addition to what the government already owes them.
As fucked up as it sounds, if the law says they are owed this money, thats what the law says, and they should get it. Congress should look at the situation though, and see about changing the law so that their next stimulus payments get reduced by, oh, 165 million plus whatever these bonuses were for(can't remember the exact amount).
I'm not a fan of how this bailout is proceeding in general. Ok, this is a big problem, and the failure of these companies risks a full blown economic depression. We can prevent that from happening by spending hundereds of billions of dollars to prop up these companies.
Ok, fine. If thats what it costs to prevent the second Great Depression, I'm fine with the government spending that much. Not happy about it, but its definitely the lesser of two evils IMO.
But it seems more like a nationalization plan than temporarily propping them up so they have time to fix the problems that lead to this situation. I don't like this.
Surely the 80% shareholder, ie the government, can step up and stop this case... Surely when you own 80% of a company you should have sufficient power over it.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
May the American People be forgiven, for when faced with a big mess, they chose Justice over better ways to reduce the mess.
$170 Billion dollars of problem
$170 Million dollars of justice
"Hey...are you a talented mortgage underwriter? How would you like to come help us work out our mess at AIG? The American People want your help, and will have your back. We're all about what's RIGHT, so come join us in our effort."
uggh.
At face value? no. but they have been dissected.
They got a sweet deal.
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/18/dissecting-the-aig-bonus-contract/?em
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Lawyers: 195908092
The rest of us: 0
dammit! we lose again
Read what I mean, not what I wrote.
that kind of profiteering is reserved for stock brokers!
(que a quote from Ralph Bellamy in "Trading Places" right about now)
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Yes, nut I think it has to do with the scope.
I wouldn't want to see every tax change posted here, even though it impacts us all.
It's a hard line to draw.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
and think they can simply circumvent the law when it suits them.
I remember all the crying over Clinton, all the crying over Bush, but regardless of which party held the whitehouse or which held congress, the real problem has always been Congress.
Congress has turned into the ultimate entitlement, the ultimate expression of power corrupts.
It matters not which party is in charge, unless you count how eager the press is to chase them, it only matters that the same old people are there year after year.
Congress knows better, they just don't care. They think they are above the law because they are the law in their eyes. They have become judge and jury and we let them get away with it.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
and just like Dashcel only paid it when cornered. Geitner was hoping to get past the statute of limitations...
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Inflation is the continuous theft or taxation of everyone that owns or is owed money.
What is egregious is that most people think that inflation is somehow natural.
I sincerely believe ... that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale. - Thomas Jefferson
Section 10 - Powers prohibited of States No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.
Why are U.S. taxes being handing money to foreigners?
May be because AIG owed them a buck or two?
...a stunned silence fell upon the hall.
... I mean what do they have to do to get a proper riot?
How exactly is it a specific problem of the liberals?
May be you could give your definition of liberals here too? Because by definition I know, a liberal believes in the power of a free (liberal) market or society without regulation or too much intervention from the state.
...a stunned silence fell upon the hall.
And then have those entitled suing AIG/Government and get the bonuses still plus costs plus damages?
...a stunned silence fell upon the hall.
The people getting these bonuses don't have to fucking take them. They can, you know, say "thanks but no thanks, I just dont feel right taking taxpayer money like this". Would you take the money? I know I wouldn't.
The fact that these people seem to have taken the money means, in my book, they are horrible people so fuck 'em. If they were decent humans, they'd go on Leno or something and say "I refused to take the money" and we would cheer them as heros (or something).
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aC_hgTeumc70
And when they get more money, they'll sue again. Then again. And aga
***Stack Overflow***
You are right that they can't say "We are taxing AIG execs," that would be something that applies to a specific group, and thus unconstitutional. However, it may well be that they can find a perfectly constitutional way to do this. Perhaps they make it so that there is a special tax levied against corporate bonuses when those bonuses are from companies that have received TARP funds. That sort of thing may work. You can tax different sources of money differently, like income vs capital gains and such.
They may well be able to find a way to make this perfectly legal.
That's really misapplying the term "gambling". Gambling is defined as money, or anything of value, that is risked for possible gain. The important thing here is the "gain" part. You are betting something, hoping to make an over all gain. That's not the case with insurance. When you insure your home, you are not hoping to make a gain on it. If your home burns down, they don't pay you a hundred million dollars, they pay you the value of the home and its contents (or the limits of the policy, whatever is less).
You aren't gaining anything, and you certainly aren't hoping that it'll happen. What you are doing is transferring risk. You cannot afford to pay out the cost of a new house. Thus the risk of losing it isn't acceptable. So you purchase insurance. They agree to assume the risk. Should the house be destroyed, they pay for it, you don't. In trade for that, they collect regular monies and get to keep them if nothing goes wrong. Your insurer may in fact then do the same thing. They might assume the risk for small things, but transfer the risk for a large event to another insurance company that specializes in that.
That's all insurance is. It isn't gambling, it is risk transfer. That is also why there are cases where it is advisable to NOT have insurance. For example if you have a car that is old and has a low book value, collision insurance is a waste of money. If you wreck the car, you can afford to replace it. Thus there's no reason to transfer the risk, just assume it yourself. Also the amount they charge is such that after awhile, you have already paid out anything you'd get.
So no, it isn't gambling. Gambling is what you do in a casino. If you don't see a difference between that and insurance, well then you need to do a bit more research.
I think we're past that now. As we come to full understanding of how badly we've been had the result could very well be to undermine the "full faith and credit of these United States". The irony is that the idiots that pulled this trick will then find their inflated bank balances as worthless as the IOU's of an unemployed meth addict. They did it all for nothing.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
As the growing recession drags on, there is a new martyr of the minute for those who are caught now (but only at private companies) bathing in government dollars. AIG and its cohorts may have created the most sensational recent example of poor use of taxpayer funds, yet overlooked in the national media dialog is how many old ideas concerning government spending have been reinvented to represent different concepts in this time of crisis.
In the most recent stimulus bill- the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009- a massive $787 billion dollars in spending was unleashed from the public coffers in a very expedited manor. The president challenged the congress to oppose the bill, saying âoewhat we canâ(TM)t do is drag our feet or allow the same partisan differences to get in our way.â The public demands action to our growing economic problems, and the modern media made sure Obamaâ(TM)s version of the story was soon clear to the American public.
The narrative about the economy has always had a few sides. Universities around the nation have for a long time incubated a non-decisive discourse on the economy. Two schools of thought have been debated back and forth in academia: Adam Smithâ(TM)s model touting the greater benefits of the free market vs. John Maynard Keynesâ(TM)s economic model that stipulates that government spending is the best way to get through an economic crises.
With our current federal policy the Democratically Controlled government has declared a winner between the two, and the mainstream media seems happy to report that this decision will apparently allow the nation to put this nasty recession thing behind us. You canâ(TM)t blame them though- it makes good sense on the surface for the media to come to this conclusion. If the current nationally agreed upon model is a Keynesian one of government spending, then who better to do the job-if you go by the past century of the American narrative-than the Democrats. One of the old favorite Republican adages is to call the Democrats âoetax and spend librals.â
Nowadays Obama is proud to boast the Democratic Partyâ(TM)s credentials are spenders of the publicâ(TM)s coin. FDR and his legacy of spending during the Depression is heeded as the new best old way to do things. But the new Democratic Party canâ(TM)t get support for the same projects Roosevelt did; they needed new ideas to capture the heart of the nation. So where did the Democratic Party look for these new ideas? The same place they kept their old ones.
One big part of the conversation is so called âoeGreen Collared Jobsâ that are to be created by the millions due to government spending contained in the stimulus package. Suddenly the subject of saving the environment became less about losing jobs (from private corporations that are negatively affected by environmental regulation) to making them through new government spending on environmental projects. In the age where Keynes is king, the idea that subsidized industries are less efficient than private ones that are affected by free market forces is all of a sudden a good thing.
Yet there is an important question the media never asked during the passage of the important bill. What mechanisms or provisions are in the legislation to guarantee that the jobs created by its passing will be American ones? On Obamaâ(TM)s website it states that he plans to âoehelp create five million new jobs by strategically investing $150 billion over the next ten years to catalyze private efforts to build a clean energy future.â
The problem is that the wind-turbines, solar farms and clean coal factories that Obama professes to be enamored with can be full of parts made in China. In fact, we all know it would be cheaper to build the bits there and put the final product together here. That is what America is good at nowadays. The website never specifies that the 5 million jobs be American ones.
But jobs installing wind-turbines and putting together
Open Source Sushi
First the government didn't take them over entirely. However even if they did, that doesn't remove contracts. Contracts survive buyouts, transfers, etc. You don't get to buy a company and just abandon all the previous contracts. That could lead to tons of abuse. For example:
Suppose you have a contract with your company, you get 10% of sales on an idea you patent, paid yearly. So you create a brilliant new product and patent it for the company. They make hundreds of millions of dollars selling it. End of the year rolls around, time for your payout. You get nothing, none of the millions your contract stipulated. So you go to the owner and say "What the hell?" He says "Oh well see I sold the company to my brother (who was the CFO). So now I'm the CFO and he owns the company. That contract isn't valid anymore." They use the company as a shell game, transferring it back and forth to get out of contracts.
Well doesn't work like that. The contract survives the transfer.
Obviously there are downsides to that, we see one here. However over all, that's how you want things to work. You want that when something changes hands, contracts go with it. As another example, how would you feel if your bank got bought by another bank, or maybe just sold your mortgage and the new bank said "We didn't like that old contract so the new one is 30% interest, retroactive to the beginning of the loan." Fortunately for you, that mortgage is a contract, and they've got to honour the terms.
ED-209 only offered 20 seconds to comply. Personally, I'd just open fire until I emptied my guns and tell the smoking remains, "You shouldn't have pissed us off..."
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
But, since "we" own 80 some-odd percent of AIG, can't "we" just call a shareholders meeting, stop the lawsuit, fire a bunch of the bastards and well, basically do whatever "we" want with their bloated, stinking carcass? I'm just sayin'...
The elucidating comment I've read on this so far was from http://www.reddit.com/r/business/comments/85nk2/spitzer_the_aig_bonuses_are_a_smokescreen/c08bmtg
__________________________________________________________________
About the current CEO:
* He's being paid 1 dollar a year.
* He gets no bonuses, either way.
* He gets no stocks.
* He didn't sign these contracts, he inherited them.
About the people who tanked AIG:
* They are gone.
* They were few.
About the people who received the bonuses:
* They did not kill AIG
* They were offered these bonuses last year, to stay for another year, and clean up the mess.
* They reduced $2.7 trillion of shit to $1.6 trillion of shit.
About the bonuses:
* They are less than .1% of the bailout money.
* They were offered last year, to retain people until they cleaned up the mess.
* They were NOT meant to retain people for next year.
What if we didn't pay them?
* The people who are (successfully) cleaning up the mess, would leave.
* Then, they would sue (rightfully so).
* AIG would have to try to replace them, while trying to prevent losses on the suddenly 'unmanaged' accounts.
* AIG might be forced into bankruptcy, for defaulting (aka: we lose).
* AIG might survive, but take further losses, and need more help (aka: we lose).
Personal thoughts:
* We should have let them fail, but we didn't, it would be idiotic to let them fail now.
* The current CEO deserves nothing but respect, but instead, he gets death threats.
* The people who stayed on, and cleaned up the mess, deserve to be well paid. They saved us a ton of money, and the bonuses are marginal in comparison.
Analogy:
The people from FP (financial products) are the burger flippers at McDonalds. The people who got the bonuses work the counter at McDonalds. The burger flippers made some seriously shitty burgers. They got fired. The counter crew has spent the last year trying to find places to safely unload those burgers (worm farms, bacteria labs, etc.) It was a dirty job, and Mike Rowe wasn't available.
Yes, I'm contradicting a post I made yesterday. I watched the full hearings on C-Span today http://c-span.org/Watch/watch.aspx?MediaId=HP-R-16464, and learned a hell of a lot from them. Yeah, I changed my mind, but that's what I do when I learn that the facts don't match my perception.
__________________________________________________________________
Environmentalism is the new Victorianism. Everyone ties on a green corset and pretends we're virtuous.
Millions of people worker harder than these pen pushing gordon geckos, tell me why can an individual deserve a 1M bonus for loosing millions more in deals. Get back to reality AIG employees, live like the rest of the populace, fixed income, no bonuses , no over time, no paid lunches.
Dont like it, quit.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
They could rebuild the shuttles using titanium as per spec. Build 20 of them.
Finish the ISS in one year.
Build 2 or 3 moon bases.
WTF is it useful if the bank gets it?
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
I keep getting sucked in by this argument and then it dawns on me that more time on this petite thing is less time spent on more important things as to whether these bailouts should have happened at all. This is simply an unintended consequence of bad policy.
Remember when Pelosi was rushing the vote so she could fly out to Paris? NO ONE could read the crap nor did it get published on the internet AS SHE PROMISED in time for the public review.
They created a crisis to rush spending. And now you have a president who is making a budget when that is not even in his job. Further more, he's doing a massive grab of power by trying to take the census. Keep voting for change and that's all there is going to be left. The Left.
AIG has to pay back the $170 billion, people, let's keep that in mind.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/26793903/the_big_takeover/5
AIG decided to pay out another $450 million in bonuses. And to whom? To the 400 or so employees in Cassano's old unit, AIGFP, which is due to go out of business shortly! Yes, that's right, an average of $1.1 million in taxpayer-backed money apiece, to the very people who spent the past decade or so punching a hole in the fabric of the universe!
and so on.
The whole article is actually well written and is a informative read.
...a stunned silence fell upon the hall.
Barack Obama - hell bent on bankrupting the USA once and for all.
- Chairman Barack Hussein "The Teleprompter" Obama is deeply connected to corruption, Rahm Emanuel (Radical authoritarian Statist-Zionist whose father was part of the Murderous Civilian Killing Israeli Terrorist Organization known as IRGUN), Connected to Rod Blagojevich (Rahm inherited Rod's federal-congress seat), Connected to Ayers, a man who promotes the concept that civilian collateral damage is ok in a war against freedom, Preacher Jeremiah Wright, who is himself a black-elitist who wants all the people who largely "pay the freight" to suffer, 31 million on food stamps, more blacks are in prison and on food-stamps per capita than anyone else. The problem with Wright is simply this: the facts are "racist."
- Obama: Racist, AIPAC-Zionist, Corrupted and a Traitor and a Liar who can't even produce a valid birth certificate (which is not a certificate of live birth)
- Raytheon lobbyist in Pentagon
- Goldman Sachs insider second in command at Treasury.
- Cabinet has had several nominees and appointees with multiple tax fraud issues.
- The head of the IRS and the head of the Treasury, Geithner, is a Tax Cheat
- Lied about no lobbyists
- Lied about having a new degree of accountability and a SUNSHINE period of new laws, he has signed bills with little or no review at whitehouse.gov as promised.
- Appointed a second amendment violating Rich-pardoning treasonist Eric Holder as AG, the top cop of the USA, a man who helped a fugitive evade justice.
- Has not put a dime in for a single new nuclear power plant but wants to help bridges and roads to promote more driving.
- Obama, Blagojevich and Rahm Emanuel have a LOT to hide. They literally lived next to each other, Rahm had (until being Chairman Obama's Chief of staff) Blagojevich's old federal congressional seat. Blagojevich helped Chairman "The Teleprompter" Obama cheat his way to the Illinois senate by getting other candidates thrown off the ballot in Illinois. Why do you think Blagojevich was so mad? Obama DID owe him, big time. Rahm and Obama are using Blagojevich and trying to cut his head off to keep him away.
- Tony Rezko, Iraqi Arms Dealer Nahdmi Auchi, and of course Aiham Alsammarae. Chairman "The Teleprompter" Hussein Obama is so corrupted its a joke.
- Fools and "useful idiots" twist the pie charts by leaving welfare, workfare, interest on debt, social security, Medicare and Medicaid out and focusing only on non-whole "discretionary" pie charts.
2007 high level pie chart, Federal Budget, USA
2009 Pie chart, detailed, Federal Budget, USA
- Chairman Obama is drastically increasing spending and creating more entitlements that will make the US less competitive (especially against China, India, East Europe/Russia). This will be a huge disaster and change you can believe in will strap you and your grandkids with more debt. No taxation without representation? Obama is spending money for the next two-three generations and they can't even vote yet, or even have been born.
- An alternative to the dollar and a forex and a reserve currency came up at the last G20 meeting. The world will not take faith in Obama's liar-socialist spending and welfare state, why should the taxpayers (plebian citizen-slaves of a police state).
- The spending going on now vastly eclipses all previous spending. In fact, the massive trillion plus debts is a thing of the 80's onwards. Congress signs the checks, remember that Year after year, as egregious as the pentagon spending is, that the social spending is completely a waste of money and it is unfunded over the long term. Eisenhower built the interstates, the US could build a new power infrastructure with this money but instead is being pissed into creating more of an entitlement system that is STILL unfunded, and without massive poll-taxes a
Afro-Leninst Obama Bankrupting the USA Tsarkon Rpt
Barack Hussein Barry-Soetoro-Afro-Leninist Obama II. , hell bent on bankrupting the USA once and for all.
- Chairman Barack Hussein "The Teleprompter" Obama is deeply connected to corruption, Rahm Emanuel (Radical authoritarian Statist-Zionist whose father was part of the Murderous Civilian Killing Israeli Terrorist Organization known as IRGUN), Connected to Rod Blagojevich (Rahm inherited Rod's federal-congress seat), Connected to Ayers, a man who promotes the concept that civilian collateral damage is ok in a war against freedom, Preacher Jeremiah Wright, who is himself a black-elitist who wants all the people who largely "pay the freight" to suffer, 31 million on food stamps, more blacks are in prison and on food-stamps per capita than anyone else. The problem with Wright is simply this: the facts are "racist."
- Obama: Racist, AIPAC-Zionist, Corrupted and a Traitor and a Liar who can't even produce a valid birth certificate (which is not a certificate of live birth)
- Raytheon lobbyist in Pentagon
- Goldman Sachs insider second in command at Treasury.
- Cabinet has had several nominees and appointees with multiple tax fraud issues.
- The head of the IRS and the head of the Treasury, Geithner, is a Tax Cheat
- Lied about no lobbyists
- Lied about having a new degree of accountability and a SUNSHINE period of new laws, he has signed bills with little or no review at whitehouse.gov as promised.
- Appointed a second amendment violating Rich-pardoning treasonist Eric Holder as AG, the top cop of the USA, a man who helped a fugitive evade justice.
- Has not put a dime in for a single new nuclear power plant but wants to help bridges and roads to promote more driving.
- Obama, Blagojevich and Rahm Emanuel have a LOT to hide. They literally lived next to each other, Rahm had (until being Chairman Obama's Chief of staff) Blagojevich's old federal congressional seat. Blagojevich helped Chairman "The Teleprompter" Obama cheat his way to the Illinois senate by getting other candidates thrown off the ballot in Illinois. Why do you think Blagojevich was so mad? Obama DID owe him, big time. Rahm and Obama are using Blagojevich and trying to cut his head off to keep him away.
- Tony Rezko, Iraqi Arms Dealer Nahdmi Auchi, and of course Aiham Alsammarae. Chairman "The Teleprompter" Hussein Obama is so corrupted its a joke.
- Fools and "useful idiots" twist the pie charts by leaving welfare, workfare, interest on debt, social security, Medicare and Medicaid out and focusing only on non-whole "discretionary" pie charts.
2007 high level pie chart, Federal Budget, USA
2009 Pie chart, detailed, Federal Budget, USA
- Chairman Obama is drastically increasing spending and creating more entitlements that will make the US less competitive (especially against China, India, East Europe/Russia). This will be a huge disaster and change you can believe in will strap you and your grandkids with more debt. No taxation without representation? Obama is spending money for the next two-three generations and they can't even vote yet, or even have been born.
- An alternative to the dollar and a forex and a reserve currency came up at the last G20 meeting. The world will not take faith in Obama's liar-socialist spending and welfare state, why should the taxpayers (plebian citizen-slaves of a police state).
- The spending going on now vastly eclipses all previous spending. In fact, the massive trillion plus debts is a thing of the 80's onwards. Congress signs the checks, remember that Year after year, as egregious as the pentagon spending is, that the social spending is completely a waste of money and it is unfunded over the long term. Eisenhower built the interstates, the US could build a new power infrastructure with this money but instead is being piss
Barack Obama - hell bent on bankrupting the USA once and for all.
- Chairman Barack Hussein "The Teleprompter" Obama is deeply connected to corruption, Rahm Emanuel (Radical authoritarian Statist-Zionist whose father was part of the Murderous Civilian Killing Israeli Terrorist Organization known as IRGUN), Connected to Rod Blagojevich (Rahm inherited Rod's federal-congress seat), Connected to Ayers, a man who promotes the concept that civilian collateral damage is ok in a war against freedom, Preacher Jeremiah Wright, who is himself a black-elitist who wants all the people who largely "pay the freight" to suffer, 31 million on food stamps, more blacks are in prison and on food-stamps per capita than anyone else. The problem with Wright is simply this: the facts are "racist."
- Obama: Racist, AIPAC-Zionist, Corrupted and a Traitor and a Liar who can't even produce a valid birth certificate (which is not a certificate of live birth)
- Raytheon lobbyist in Pentagon
- Goldman Sachs insider second in command at Treasury.
- Cabinet has had several nominees and appointees with multiple tax fraud issues.
- The head of the IRS and the head of the Treasury, Geithner, is a Tax Cheat
- Lied about no lobbyists
- Lied about having a new degree of accountability and a SUNSHINE period of new laws, he has signed bills with little or no review at whitehouse.gov as promised.
- Appointed a second amendment violating Rich-pardoning treasonist Eric Holder as AG, the top cop of the USA, a man who helped a fugitive evade justice.
- Has not put a dime in for a single new nuclear power plant but wants to help bridges and roads to promote more driving.
- Obama, Blagojevich and Rahm Emanuel have a LOT to hide. They literally lived next to each other, Rahm had (until being Chairman Obama's Chief of staff) Blagojevich's old federal congressional seat. Blagojevich helped Chairman "The Teleprompter" Obama cheat his way to the Illinois senate by getting other candidates thrown off the ballot in Illinois. Why do you think Blagojevich was so mad? Obama DID owe him, big time. Rahm and Obama are using Blagojevich and trying to cut his head off to keep him away.
- Tony Rezko, Iraqi Arms Dealer Nahdmi Auchi, and of course Aiham Alsammarae. Chairman "The Teleprompter" Hussein Obama is so corrupted its a joke.
- Fools and "useful idiots" twist the pie charts by leaving welfare, workfare, interest on debt, social security, Medicare and Medicaid out and focusing only on non-whole "discretionary" pie charts.
2007 high level pie chart, Federal Budget, USA
2009 Pie chart, detailed, Federal Budget, USA
- Chairman Obama is drastically increasing spending and creating more entitlements that will make the US less competitive (especially against China, India, East Europe/Russia). This will be a huge disaster and change you can believe in will strap you and your grandkids with more debt. No taxation without representation? Obama is spending money for the next two-three generations and they can't even vote yet, or even have been born.
- An alternative to the dollar and a forex and a reserve currency came up at the last G20 meeting. The world will not take faith in Obama's liar-socialist spending and welfare state, why should the taxpayers (plebian citizen-slaves of a police state).
- The spending going on now vastly eclipses all previous spending. In fact, the massive trillion plus debts is a thing of the 80's onwards. Congress signs the checks, remember that Year after year, as egregious as the pentagon spending is, that the social spending is completely a waste of money and it is unfunded over the long term. Eisenhower built the interstates, the US could build a new power infrastructure with this money but instead is being pissed into creating more of an entitlement system that is STILL unfunded, and without massive poll-taxes a
First of all, I've read my fair share of Sklansky too.
Second, you're grossly misapply a gambling viewpoint to the situation of homeowner's insurance for a huge number of reasons.
First, insurance companies don't permit you to take out multiple insurance policies on the same house, save when the secondary insurance stipulates that it takes effect outside the limits of the first. (So if Policy A doesn't cover flood damage, you can get policy B to fill that gap. But Policy B will stipulate that if you DO have flood insurance on another policy, then your cover under policy B is invalid, or other such limit).
Second, a lot of efficient insurance policies are actually +EV by their very nature. The insurance business has a term called "cost of float". Insurance collects a ton of money up front for events which may or may not occur down the road. They do their best to predict the cost of the sum of those future events, and they're good at it.
It turns out that in many cases, *if* you value your dollars at $0, your cost to self-insure will actually be higher, because the insurance company is actually collecting less money from you than they expect to pay out.
How? There's a time value to money. If an insurance company has a "cost of float" of 102%, it means for every $1M in premiums collected, they expect to pay out $1,020,000. Nominally a loss, but the payouts are far enough into the future that they can invest the money now, earn a return, make the payment, and have a profit.
If you're judging on a more immediate term - ie, "Well, I can take out insurance and wreck the house, which would only sell for $200k, but the policy will pay $250k", then your "+EV situation" is predicated upon the commission of a serious crime. Tons of people go to jail for insurance fraud, thinking they can game the system. So you'll have to factor in the EV of a long prison term.
This relies on an assumption of insurance fraud. Insurance doesn't pay out when you cause the "outcome". "Winning" a bet over insurance in that way is analagous to "winning" a poker hand by pulling out a gun and telling the other guy that you're going to shoot him if he doesn't fold.