Obama and Dodd Hypocritical on AIG Bonuses

In response to public outrage, Obama is belatedly criticizing the millions of dollars in bonuses that AIG,
which is being bailed by taxpayers at a cost of $170 billion, is paying
to its executives. But his criticism is hypocritical and dishonest,
both because his administration had long known about the bonuses before
they became public, and because the stimulus package he himself signed
contains a provision expressly designed to shield those undeserved
bonuses.

Who put that provision there? Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT), who received $103,100 in campaign donations from AIG. Since 2003, AIG
has made most of its vast campaign contributions to liberal lawmakers —
including 68 percent of its contributions in 2008. (Dodd, the Chairman
of the Senate Banking Committee, is under an ethical cloud after having
received a sweetheart deal from the ailing sub-prime mortgage lender
Countrywide).

While executives at AIG
get bonuses courtesy of the taxpayer, unions will be receiving billions
in inflated and wasteful contracts courtesy of restrictions on state
projects contained in the stimulus package.

Liberal
lawmakers have also taken steps to insure that illegal aliens and
people who lied on their loan applications will benefit from the
bailouts.

Obama claimed an economic catastrophe would happen
if Congress didn’t pass the bloated $800 billion stimulus package,
which guts welfare reform. But now the Congressional Budget Office
admits that the “stimulus” will actually make the economy smaller “in
the long run.”