Dodd Tries to Undo Bonus Protections He Put In...

[Henry Hawk]

Dodd Tries to Undo Bonus Protections He Put In


Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) on Monday night floated the idea of taxing American International Group  bonus recipients so the government could recoup some or all of the $450 million the company is paying to employees in its financial products unit. Within hours, the idea spread to both houses of Congress, with lawmakers proposing an AIG bonus tax.

The move represents somewhat of an about-face for the Senator.

While the Senate was constructing the $787 billion stimulus last month, Dodd added an executive-compensation restriction to the bill. That amendment provides an "exception for contractually obligated bonuses agreed on before Feb. 11, 2009" -- which exempts the very AIG bonuses Dodd and others are now seeking to tax.

The amendment made it into the final version of the bill, and is law.

Separately, Sen. Dodd was AIG's largest single recipient of campaign donations during the 2008 election cycle with $103,100, according to opensecrets.org.

Dodd's office did not immediately return a request for comment.

I think THIS says alot about the democrat party and our state of the economy...

[me]

There is something I started wondering about last night about these bonus'.  I always thought to earn a bonus one had to perform and under the circumstances it would seem like the executives failed to do so by the fact that the company would have had to go into bankruptcy, or so they say, without the bail out money.  If this is fact then they would not be eligible for any bonus money because they did not perform in such a manner as to deserve one.  Anyway that's my thought on the subject for what it's worth.  I'm sure Ex will have some thoughts on this, my thoughts being worth anything that is....

[Exterminator]

I think this article hits the nail on the head.

[Henry Hawk]

That is interesting....i don't know the fulll story, but this DOES seem to fit the "outrageously one-sided and unconscionable - contract terms"...

[Henry Hawk]

let's think about this for a minute......congress gives AIG...$173 billion....and $93 billion of that ends up at a bunch of European banks and Goldman Sachs.....and Obama has a wedgy over $165 MILLON to executives?....that is chump change in the whole light of things........the bigger question is...why are we bailing out European banks?...

[Henry Hawk]

and if they would have simply let them go bankrupt....there would have been NO bonus' for anybody....and we could have used the $173 BILLION dollars for tax cuts, that would have stimulated this economy NOW!

[mcgonser]

I don't want to see a tax on these bonuses, I want them paid back in full now. Also no more money to AIG ever.

[Ma and Pa]

I think the Mafia might be able to help us out with this problem; probably at a bargain-basement price. And I'm not putting a "smiley" at the end of this post.

[Henry Hawk]

two more thoughts....shouldn't the people who hired these executives be the ones who should be paying back these outrageous bonus'?....

and, why is there not more outrage at CONGRESS, the ones who just THREW BILLIONS of dollars at these guys, without any REAL accountability?...

[Exterminator]

two more thoughts....shouldn't the people who hired these executives be the ones who should be paying back these outrageous bonus'?....

Not sure where you're going with that.

and, why is there not more outrage at CONGRESS, the ones who just THREW BILLIONS of dollars at these guys, without any REAL accountability?...

Maybe because a lot of the money initially didn't come from Congress but from the Federal Reserve working on Bush's authority?

[Henry Hawk]

Not sure where you're going with that.

I mean the board members or whoever makes the decision to hire and assign the bonus'.......those guys should be the ones accountable, not the guy who is getting the bonus.

Maybe because a lot of the money initially didn't come from Congress but from the Federal Reserve working on Bush's authority?

No, it was people like Frank and Dodd who inserted language — known as the Dodd amendment — in the $787 billion stimulus bill that allowed all bonuses awarded before February 11, 2009, to be paid to AIG executives

he should be the one paying back this....quit trying to defend these guys and pin it on Bush....these guys are frauds...period.

[Henry Hawk]

Dodd ironically received over $100,000 in campaign donations from AIG last year....and then he decided to protect these guys with their bonus'...........Obama should call for the resignation of Dodd....he is caught RED HANDED with his hand in the cookie jar.....THAT is where ALL the OUTRAGE should be!!!...

[me]

So did Obama.  He received $101,332 in contributions.

[Exterminator]

No, it was people like Frank and Dodd who inserted language — known as the Dodd amendment — in the $787 billion stimulus bill that allowed all bonuses awarded before February 11, 2009, to be paid to AIG executives

he should be the one paying back this....quit trying to defend these guys and pin it on Bush....these guys are frauds...period.

I tried to give you enough information to encourage you to research the subject before continuting to make yourself look uninformed but to no avail...

On September 16, 2008, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York extended a line of cerdit to AIG in the amount of $85 billion.  Congress had nothing to do with it.

On October 9, 2008, the company borrowed an additional $37.8 billion from the Fed via a second line of credit.  Congress also had nothing to do with this.

On November 10, 2008, the Treasury announced it would purchase an additional $40 billion in preferred stock from AIG, this time under the authority of H.R. 1424 (TARP); this was approved by Congress.

The workings of these three incidents get somewhat convoluted but as you can see, most of the money used to bail out AIG came directly from the Fed and was never voted on by Congress.  You can't hold them responsible for something over which they neither had a vote nor any control.

[Exterminator]

Dodd ironically received over $100,000 in campaign donations from AIG last year....and then he decided to protect these guys with their bonus'...........Obama should call for the resignation of Dodd....he is caught RED HANDED with his hand in the cookie jar.....THAT is where ALL the OUTRAGE should be!!!...

Funny, where was the outrage when the banks were buying congressmen left and right to get their bankruptcy bill passed?  Does it seem to anyone else like the banks were so adamant about banruptcy reform because they saw this coming?