Lead by Example

"Just as outrageous is the culture that these bonuses are a symptom of, that has existed for far too long: excess greed, excess compensation, excess risk-taking."

"We've got to have tools that under our legal authority we can do something about this." 

-President Obama.

As, Jack Welch put it HERE, the US Government owns 80% of AIG and it needs to start acting like a Board of Directors. This should not be a surprise to us that funds could be used for contracts stating a bonus.

However, the Government runs into problems when you see that in the Federal Economic and Recovery Act of 2009 (passed Feb 11, 2009) Congress placed an amendment (with mind you Sen. Dodd's name on it) that allowed all bonuses agreed upon by companies receiving bailout money PRIOR TO THE PASSAGE OF THE BILL. So, the money received by AIG can legally be used to pay contract-stipulated bonuses.

Open question to Obama: Although you are not the direct cause of the current problems with this economy (as were some of the CEOs of the Big Three not directly responsible for years of bad decisions), and because it will cost America a good amount of money to fix, WILL YOU take a salary of $1.00 each year you are in office until you get it fixed?

I mean, minimum $1.6 Million dollars over your term would cover at least one pet project right?

I await my response either in a salary cut by our President, or (more likely) a Gibbs press conference directly attacking me