If you are angry about the bonuses paid to AIG executives, then go away and read something else. What follows here is not for you. If you pump your fist and say "yeah!" when you hear Barney Frank, or Nancy Pelosi or Harry Ried or Barack Obama rant like whining little brats about how unfair and greedy private business is, then please just ignore this and go back to drinking your unemployment checks or smoking your welfare payments. You are beyond help. Let's pause for a moment and try to understand why anyone cares about the word "bonus" and how it relates particularly to AIG.  "Bonus" is a great word for demagogues to beat on with thier ugly sticks. When you hear the word "Bonus" it has the implication of something "extra" given to someone for performance above and beyond the call of duty. But, in the world of business, which a lot of people are not savvy to... it can mean a lot of different things. Instead of the word bonus, let's substitute the words tax payment. With AIG, it is basically the same thing. Salaries there are being met with the help of your tax money. A lot of people don't like that to begin with. I'm one of those people. But  in a practical sense what exactly is our tax money enabling AIG to do?  Our tax money is, among other things, enabling AIG to secure the insurance policies of businesses all around the country and the world, so that they can cover thier potential liabilities and function and provide services to you and me. To some degree a rather useful purpose. But, I wasn't asked if I thought AIG's crumbling finances should be propped up with the money that comes out of my paycheck. No one was asked that. So let's turn the video camera away from the smooth glass and steel tower of AIG that so often has been featured in the news media for a moment, and pan across the United States congress. Let's pan way, way back to a point where the entire floor of the House of Representatives is in view. Now let's do a split screen.  Another camera in the Senate is now panned way back to show you the entire Senate floor on the right side of your screen. And let's have a rolling tag line under the image keeps us updated on what the President is doing. There, in those two bodies of legislature and in the executive office, are the biggest, boldest, most outrageous peddlers of deciet and treachery this country has ever faced. And they have all gotten bonuses, every last one of them, from your tax money. But they don't want you to know that.  They would rather have you angry at AIG executives, because it takes your attention away from the hideous, overstuffed bonuses all those Representatives and Senators in congress have stolen from you. Earlier while talking about AIG I said, lets substitute the words "tax payment" for the word bonus.  Now, lets substitute the word "Earmark" for the word bonus. Same thing, but far, far more insidious. The executives at AIG who recieved salaried bonuses covered by tax payments had a contractual agreement to recive that specific amount of money as compensation for doing specific work.  But your state Senator, your state Representative... makes no such deal with you.  They take thier bonus money from your paycheck without restraint, without asking your permission, without the requirement of performing specific tasks in return for it, without having to explain it to you, without having to ever acknowledge that they took it. In fact sometimes we don't find out till much, much later exactly how much bonus money they took for themselves in form of earmarks, and exactly what they spent it on, because they try to hide it, bury it deep..., deep inside of innocent looking bills, like pirates burying thier stolen treasure in a deep hole on some deserted island hoping to keep it from  prying eyes. But what happened recently?  You started noticing.  You started catching these pirates stealing your money and burying it away for themselves. And that made you mad. Pirates don't like angry mobs. Angry mobs scare them because an angry mob might decide that they don't want these pirates around any more and might kick them off thier ship. So what did these pirates who stole bonuses for themselves in the form of secret earmarks do?  They formulated a plan to divert attention from thier thieving ways. They gave away your money to a legitimate business that was failing , to make themselves seem like good guys, like the mafia boss who gives a little of his ill gotten blood money back to the poor people in his neighborhood to make himself seem like a hero. And these pirates made you hate the legitimate business for using the money they gave them to save them. They played you. Obama's trying to pull off a mock triangulation routine but it's not going to work. He can't put himself above a fray that he created. He was out there the other day berating congress and saying he's just trying to fix problems he inhereted. Obama has two stage props that he uses wherever he goes. The Teleprompter and the Bush Administration. That way nothing is his fault, and he doesn't have to remember anything he wants to say. You notice how perturbed Obama gets when a press corp memeber tries to ask him a tough question? Obama is like an infant. He's a little toddler that all the adults think is cute and adorable and who fusses and wets his diaper anytime he's given the least little pressure from anyone in media. His teleprompter is his security blanket, our taxes are his pacifier, Pelosi is his mommy, Reid is his daddy, and Barney Frank is is strange cousin from Boston. I have not seen any signs of real leadership from Obama. His brain was injected with the folly of liberal hate throughout his formative years and we now have a liberal infant filled with hate for wealth and an attitude clearly... very very clearly ... in which he feels that he is a superior bieng to anyone who has personal wealth, which he currently defines as anyone netting over 250K. He is the essence of untaintable purity in his own mind and he is bent on cleansing the infection of wealthiness from our society. He believes there is integrity in the failure to achieve, purity in poverty, and that the only "good" folks are those who are forever struggling to make ends meet. But if you make it, he'll take it. If you achieve, he'll relieve you of your money. Looks like his poll numbers are slipping, so it's off to have a few laughs with Leno and tour the country like a one man stand up comedy act or the Michael Jackson of politics trying to redeem his image by standing around for press cameras in some cool shades and blowing kisses to the crowds.  This is our President? Do we really need this? Sheesh.
 

- Mike Silverman