Call To "Open Source" AIG Investigation

VValdo writes "As you may recall, the citizens of the US shelled out about $85 billion to bail out AIG and its creditors (Goldman Sachs in particular) last year. But as 80% owners of AIG, we still don't know what happened, exactly. That may change. In a new op-ed piece, former prosecutors (including former NY governor Eliot Spitzer) are calling for the US Treasury to force AIG to release its treasure-trove of emails to the public before allowing AIG to 'break free' of our control. As the prosecutors put it, 'By putting the evidence online, the government could establish a new form of "open source" investigation. Once the documents are available for everyone to inspect, a thousand journalistic flowers can bloom, as reporters, victims and angry citizens have a chance to piece together the story.' Good idea?"

Comments

No

[cheesybagel]

No, not a good idea. What is the point in having a Cultural Revolution? Better to just split these companies which are too big to fail into smaller chunks, kick out the top management making sure they never work in that capacity anymore, enforce layers of separation between businesses and let them free. Restore the Glass–Steagall Act and separate commercial banking from investment banking.

Re:No

[causality]

I agree, the public is just going to crucify the company. We need to move forward, fix the problems, and make sure they don't happen again.

On the other hand, this might be a great learning exercise for academia. It might be nice if accredited institutions could review a portion of the details in the interests of study cases; particularly a business ethics class (no that's not an oxymoron).

Business ethics: if it's legal, do it for short-term profit with no regard for side-effects, long-term losses, or harm that it might cause to other people. If it's not legal, grease the right palms until it becomes legal.