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

- Mike Silverman

Hey,...Secretary Paulson, Mr. President, and all you pundits and critics out there who are wringing your hands and declaring that this is the END OF DAYS for the US economy and so we need to have the 700+ billion dollar debacle created to bail out the big financial players on Wall Street.   One thing to keep in mind, don't under estimate "us" , the people who really make this country work. Don't under estimate the power of the constituency out here screaming at thier senators, thier representatives, "don't you dare do this!".  This is can be seen in one sense as a basic, back pocket issue that is not above the understanding of the masses.   Regular working class citizens look at this and see giant corporations possibly getting massive bailouts, while individuals who had to pay into that gargantuan pool of tax money are not getting bailed out of thier own personal financial problems at home. There is a visible disparity in this debate that is not lost on the average consumer. Talk of massive infusions of tax money to save companies from thier own bad business practices is something that festers in the public mind. Why should the individual at home, have to take responsibility for thier own bad financial decisions, but the big banks and insurance companies get off the hook? And of course, gall of Paulson and , sadly, of our sitting President in this matter, to insist that this is not a matter that can wait for open debate and to demand that our tax money go to this boondoggle this week to be overseen by one man like an Emperor on a golden throne, is simply outrageous.  This is a clear imbalance, and definitely not the American way. If you believe, as our founding fathers did, that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are moral issues, then you have to believe that tax is a moral issue as well since the level of taxation is a measure of the oppressive burden working against those founding moral principles. Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of our congress, if you want to be on the side of  "the people" , send that 700+ billion back to the public in the form of an income tax rebate for individuals and small businesses all across the country. Then "We The People" will decide whether to bail out the banks by continuing to do business with them or not.
 
- Mike Silverman, Milford MA

John McCain and Barack Obama have called a one day truce on criticism in honor of memorializing 9/11/2001.  That's fine, but I have no such compunction to restrict my opinions about Barack Obama on any given day that he continues to be the Presidential Candidate of the Democrat Party whose policies will harm this country. In fact I think today is a particularly poignant day to point out why Obama's policies will endanger our country and leave us more vulnerable if he becomes President. First, let me say that I agree with Senator Joe Biden.  Hillary would have been a better pick for Obama as VP, than himself. ( Indeed I suspect the Obama camp now regrets choosing Biden).  Now..., I will refer to the startling idiocy of Obama's economic ideas as evidenced by a 2007 piece of legislation he supported. In August of 2007 Barack Obama and two Senate co-sponsors introduced a repressive bill to the Senate called the Patriot Employer Act. Nice sounding title eh? It's got that word "Patriot" in there. Sort of makes you think it's something that supports strengthening the foundations of our national security and economy.  Well, forget it. The bill was designed to "encourage" US companies to abide by the sponsor's dubious definition of "Patriotism". What does Obama define as "patriotism"?...well... here we go. Obama's favored economic bill defined a Patriotic business as one that pays at least 60% of all employees health insurance premiums, makes no attempt to dissuade union organizing drives, Keeps the same number or more..., of active employees domestically in the US relative to the amount of people they hire for any international locations of thier business, pay every single employee at least as much as what the federal government chooses to define as the "poverty level" for a family of 3, and must provide a pension plan for all employees. And what do these businesses get for falling in line with the bill's definition of Patriotism?  A 1% tax break on thier annual profits.  
Whoop-de-doo. Now, here's the kicker. To finance the 1% tax credit, if you run a US company  with sites overseas then... "Ta da" ... you have to pay the US tax rate on profits earned in those international locations, rather than the local tax rate of those countries. This amounts to a massive tax increase for any  companies with international locations. You can read the text of the legislation at the following library of congress web page;  http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c110:1:./temp/~mdbshE5fec::
 
- Mike Silverman