First, AIG takes more than $160 BILLION from us taxpayers in lieu of a bankruptcy that would have wiped out any and all further compensation for their management . . . this is not, by the way all, at once but in at least FOUR seperate bailouts over the last 6-7 months.

Hold on here, there is probably something before the above first.? It is the fact that management of AIG found the capacity and intellect to turn one of the biggest (and profitable) corporations in the world into a joke and house of cards with their stupid and reckless investments in derivative financial transactions.? With a company this big (over 100,000 employees) there must be at least 1,000 executives that are grossly overpaid and thus there are 1,000 job openings for the unemployed.

Back on track now. Second, AIG manages to loose more than any company in history last quarter.? The total is an incredible $161,000,000,000!? IN ONE THREE MONTH PERIOD!

Third, with our taxpayer investment to bail out AIG and their incompetent management we (the taxpayers) now own about 80% of the stock of this failed company.

Fourth, the management of AIG has been responsible for ‘pushing’ the stock too hard.? Yeh, pushing it all the way from $74/share to a low of $0.34/share? on March 2, 2009.? Don’t get out your calculators, I’ll do the work for you.? That is a decline in stock value of 99%!!

Fifth, our leaders (from Bush and Paulson to Obama and Giethner) believe that AIG is TOO big to let fail.? Well, the market cap of that entire company was only $1 Billion just a week ago (it is about $2.2 Billion today).? To give you some perspective some other ’struggling’ ?companies today have a market cap (multiply shares outstanding by the price of a singe share) of: GM — $1.5B, CITI bank?– $13.6 B, Ford — $5.5 B, and DELL — $18 B.

Sixth, we (and I guess here I have to mean the Treasury Department by default) ought to be making the key decisions about this company going forward.? Certainly NOT the management who got the company into this mess.? (As a further aside here, if the mafia had any money invested in AIG?then maybe we won’t have to worry about current managment much longer — unless they can manage from the bottom of the Hudson while wearing stylish cement boots)

And lastly, there is an argument out there that we have to keep the idiots who are managing this company in place to complete the workout.? Holy Cow!? Hey, Batman, isn’t it true that hundreds of thousands of the best financial minds in the business (oxymoron) are UNEMPLOYED right now.? NOBODY NEEDS BONUSES IN THIS MARKET TO KEEP A JOB.? There are?at least?10,000 capable people who would do anything right now to get any job let alone one like helping turn around AIG.? Count me in that list.

AIG is a mess.? The picture above, represents the executive kitchen at AIG.? It is indicative of how management there operates.? Make a mess … go on to the next thing … make another mess … go on to the next.? They just don’t bother to clean up first.? My mother would send me to my room if I went out to play before cleaning up!

Clean this mess up President Obama, they are NOT to lare to fail.? Stop any bonuses from being paid Mr. Giethner, this company does not need the kind of management they have now.? Send the knuckleheads responsible for the bonuses to their rooms (and I hope they are 12′x8′ rooms with bars).

Stop the bonuses.? Don’t permit the American taxpayer to be a part of such incredible ‘hutzpah’ and insensitivity.? These guys managing AIG don’t deserve a second chance.? Can ‘em.? I have enough experience to step in right now and there are thousands of?unemployed out there who are a whole lot smarter than me and would jump twice as hard to get any of those?jobs.

AIG’s management — are they nuts?? Heck, yes!

thanks to flickrs photo from eschipul

Know something?? A clown isn’t funny when it does something stupid unintentionally and the flop ends up hurting others.

I?readily admit that there are?some times when certain clowns are never funny i.e. the anti-scoial and unsportsmanlike antics of Bobby Knight the “clown’ king of college basketball, or?Madoff the ‘clown’ king of immoral investment managemen? (he wants to protect $62+ million for his wife)– or any of the CEO’s of about any of the major financial and banking corporation (perhaps the?biggest clowns yet!).

The issue at hand.?? The economy.

Our Secretary of the Treasury is a sad, sad, clown though he tries not to be.? Every word he utters makes things worse. This can’t be intentional, can it?

Giethner spoke today before a Congressional committee — jeez louise,?I thought the guy was dead,?I mean where has he been since his worthless ‘high-profile’ speech a couple of weeks ago?? You know, the one that sent the markets into a tailspin.

My of my, what, an unfunny guy.? To think that I thought Bush’s appointees were clowns.? Obama’s set a new standard that indicate he recruits solely from the Barnum & Bailey school of economic napping.

Ya just gotta do something right Tim.? Don’t just stand there and watch the decline.? You are the freakin’ Secretary of the Treasury and most of us pay taxes to support you (you sadly do not pay all the taxes you should — at least until hauled in front of Congress).?? You’ve blown it, Obama guy.

Here is the situation.??We are in a fifteen month long recession (so far) and it is getting uglier by the day.??I have written about this before but in a hopeful way.? Now I find little to hope for and a lot to fear, because the new President and his team are NOT offering any encouragement or positive stimulus to the economy.? Quite the contrary.

Geithner and Obama and Reid and Pelosi are?not even trying to be bi-partisan.? They are just good old fashioned spend and govern democrats who?have now managed to push our country (not to mention the rest of the world) into the front end of a big?depression.? Soon that will be true by?almost any definition.

My new outlook (barring any real action by Obama and his crew of motley democratic fools):

Unemployment will reach 10% by mid-summer, GDP?will decline by 10% over the next year,?the recession will go on for at least 24 months (becomind a depression), and people in the USA will suffer, as will people in the U.S.?of?E (European community) and the dis-U.S.?of Soveitsky and all the other U’s and dis-U’s that are out there.? It feels real bad, this puppu could get?real ugly real soon.

Dang it Obama, I had hope for you and yours.? But you chose a tax cheat to be Secretary of the Treasury?? That should have been a glaring warning signal to you and everyone else.?Wasn’t caught by the guys in the easy chairs up on the hill.? This Giethner?guy acts like he has only that Barnum?& Bailey degree?? Come on.? How is he smarter than me?? Or anybody else for that matter?

?I had expectations of new intellectual highs in this administration.? Turns out that the smartest guy from the top down now is Joe, freakin’ Biden??? Aw, heck — how can? this be?? Biden is?only half as smart as Bush (ouch!) and he’s the smartest in this group?? Doesn’t bode well for us.? Maybe its only ‘cuz he speaks?on?TV?less often . . . but then again when he does speak — whoo momma, you wish you could just push the mute button.??Frankly I?find it hard to believe he?attended elementary school let alone graduated.?? And he was a senior senator?? How can?anyone take the guy seriously?? To be sure he reminds me of?Reese in ‘Malcom in the Middle’.

Giethner and the rest of his crew (what crew — he can’t get anyone to join the treasury let alone make it to the mandated Congressional interogation) aren’t doing the job at all??

Obama himself?? Turns out he is a great speaker . . . not such a great decider.? Not yet anyway and the clock is ticking.

Get going, Obama, my man, my fellow lover of basketball (the only truly?manly, non-neanderthal?sport in the world — except at the college and pro level where it is nothing but a showcase of bad ‘tats and worse attitudes — not the skill oriented, non-contact sport?I grew up with).

Whoops, there?I go again,?keep getting side tracked — but realize here that Biden, Pelosi, Reid and Geithner make me seem like a genius!!? Does that frighten you?? It should.?

Obama, my fellow lover of the leather-orb . . . get a clue, take some hints for the guys who manipulate the market for a living . . . they don’t like your ‘plans’ or lack of them at all.? That’s why the stock market has plummeted since your inauguration.

Nobody seems to like of believe?what you are doing (not even your fat-walleted, permanent politician, ne’er-do-wells in the democratic majority congress).? The dow down over 2,000 points since you got elected.? Banks dropping like flies in a sauna since your oath of office.? AIG, that great elusive pyramid scheme, eatin’ up our tax dollars like a happy California cow in good Utah pasture.?

The real bad news?? The whole shebang is gettin’ worse?since your great rose-colored speech a week or so ago.?? Sure you can lay out all the entitlements and social programs you and Pelosi have ever dreamed of,?just tell me how the heck are we gonna pay for them in anybody’s lifetime??

It just ain’t workin’ bud.? Take a deep breath and think it through again.? Then step up to the line a hit nothing but net by deciding and chosing some beauracats (sic) that can at least analyze the alternatives.

By the way, you can’t legislate morality, even though you seem to believe you should?legislate debt and the consequent immorality of it all.?? You wouldn’t be the first one to try and fail.?

You don’t have to make it that way.? Go after the root problem.? UNEMPLOYMENT.? If?a dude has?got a job then he?can pay his?mortgage . . . even if?his house is worth less today than a year ago.? Let the?homeowners stay in their houses for a while–until the value goes up again.? Just keep people EMPLOYED and create jobs for those that are NOT employed.

everything else is smoke and mirrors and nobody that can read at the 8th grade level is buying it.

When is a clown not funny?

Pretty much always, when the clown is a myopic democrat that believes the nincompoops in government know a lot more than the people out there that WORK FOR A LIVING and actually paying taxes.

the arrival of the depression will be too late for you to act responsibly and you have only days or maybe weeks to act — certainly not months.?

Do something smart, intelligent and right.? NOW!!? Even something funny if you must . . . just now something sad and disastrous.

IT AIN”T FUNNY NOW MAN!

Crap, I just remembered, I?hate clowns!!

?

and thanks to mel b. at flick for the photo

Frankly his speech on the new bank and financial bailout?plan (you know the . . .?the rest of the $700?billion TARP)?was one of the worst ever by a Treasury official.? Geithner (until recently the head of the NY Fed) makes Paulson?seem like superman!

After more than a week of hype all we get was:? ‘we’re gonna do a little of this and a little of that and it will cost a couple of TRILLION $$$ more and it may or may not work and we don’t know exactly what we’re gonna do and it may change but we will try and it will involve government and private sector and you may not like what you hear but it is what it is and i’m coverin’ my bases ‘cuz if it fails i still want my big government pension and . . . . .”?

Oh my gosh!? Can’t he give us even a tiny bone to chew on?

You get the idea.

the Treasury Secretary has got to have his head messed up to give such drivel to the public, the markets, the congress, the press.? After all the work you’ve done Timothy you can’t come up with something concrete?? Why talk at all??

Don’t schedule a press conference days in advance and promote it with all kinds of ridiculous hype, if you don’t have some of the right questions let alone any of the right answers!? We deserve better.??I demand better.? Obama you made a mistake here and you had better start doing something to correct it.? This guy is worse than Daschle.

Think about this.? Geithner was, afterall, part of the wonderful solution worked out in the last months of the prior administration.? You know, the solution that did such a great job with AIG, Lehmans Brothers, fannie and freddie.? Teah, those were winners and sure helped improve the situation.??Now this?

Give me a break.??I only have a Bachelors degree in economics (albeit with a MBA kicker to help undo the damamge of too much econ theory) and though I’ve only taught macro-econ one semester in college–yet,?even?I see the stupidity of talking about nothing when the nation is in crisis.?

Give us SOMETHING!!? What did he do with his Phd. in Economics?? Maybe it was from one of those mail-in schools — you know –? the University of Whats’it.? .? 47 years old and?I don’t think he has really worked for anyone other than the government!!? Maybe we need term limits for bureaucrats as well as for elected officials.? YOU JUST CAN”T WORK FOR THE GOVERMENT YOUR WHOLE LIFE AND STILL HAVE A CLUE ABOUT LIFE IN THE REAL WORLD!!!!? Does he shop at Walmart like most of the rest of us have to now?

My dad told me not to criticize unless?I had a better idea.? well?I do!!? Stop bailing out the financial institutions and the immoral ceo’s.? Let a few of them fail (maybe even more than?a few).? Force?a whole bunch?more to get new management (guys with a clue and some basic honesty).? Let the stuff fall where it may and then start over.? Bear Stearns vs Lehman Brothers . . .? yeah the Fed and Treasury got that one right and that gives us confidence going forward.? Aahhuh.? and I’ve got?some land in Florida I’d like to sell you –? cheap (but cash only, please).?

What is the saying : a pig with lipstick is still a pig?? Did?I get it right.?

This one doesn’t even have the lipstick and it sure as heck can’t fly.?

Dang ugly to look at let alone listen too.?

Strike one timothy.? By the way?here comes the next pitch!? And this one better fly!

?

tahks to jere-me of flickr for the photo