[Peace-discuss] Fw: [laborsmilitantvoice] Revolt of the bourgeoise

Sun Mar 22 14:27:19 CDT 2009

----- Original Message ----- 
From: Richard Mellor 
To: laborsmilitantvoice at yahoogroups.com 
Sent: Sunday, March 22, 2009 1:24 PM
Subject: [laborsmilitantvoice] Revolt of the bourgeoise

I see they're getting little worried. Like the Union leaders, 
they're afraid their actions might release too much class hatred and 
go too far. People might get to thinking that the Obama 
administration is serious about change.

Just shows how delicate it is though. They have to do something, but 
they must do nothing.

Richard

Obama advisers note populist tone, urge restraint
>From Associated Press
March 22, 2009 1:49 PM EDT

WASHINGTON - The White House said using tax law to pry bonuses from 
bailed-out company executives is "a dangerous way to go" and a 
Republican senator on Sunday advised against the mob mentality that 
has Congress "grabbing its pitchforks and charging up the hill" in 
pursuit of the cash.

While acknowledging public outrage over $165 million in bonuses paid 
to a financial firm that just months earlier had turned to taxpayers 
for aid, the administration's economic advisers said President Barack 
Obama wouldn't "govern out of anger."

Obama's economic team said the president would consider a 
House-backed plan that would tax insurance giant American 
International Group Inc. executives 90 percent of bonuses paid this 
year but added that he did not embrace the populist legislation. Vice 
President Joe Biden's economic adviser, Jared Bernstein, criticized 
the House plan as it headed to the Senate, where it was likely to be 
modified with bipartisan backing.

"I think the president would be concerned that this bill may have 
some problems in going too far - the House bill may go too far in 
terms of some - some legal issues, constitutional validity, using the 
tax code to surgically punish a small group," Bernstein said. "That 
may be a dangerous way to go."

Populist anger came to a head last week when the Obama administration 
went on the defensive against AIG's bonuses. It was a distraction for 
the administration as it sought support for Obama's ambitious $3.6 
trillion budget and a defense for Geithner, for whom Wall Street's 
woes have become his chief task.

White House economic adviser Austen Goolsbee said Sunday that Obama 
understands the anger and that the easiest thing would be for AIG 
executives to return the bonuses.

"The president's also been clear we don't want to govern out of 
anger. He's going to look at what comes out of the House, what comes 
out of the Senate, see what ideas we have," Goolsbee said.

Republicans and Senate Democrats seemed to line up with the 
president's policy team.

"People are disgusted and outraged, as they should be," said 
Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire. "But let's not overreact 
in a way that basically has the Congress grabbing its pitchforks, and 
charging up the hill, and abusing what is a core authority of a 
government, which is the authority to tax its people."

Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad of North Dakota, the Senate Budget 
Committee chairman, said the bonuses paid out by AIG are 
unacceptable. He said that if he were in charge of AIG, he would ask 
that the workers who got big bonuses return the money or be fired.

The bailed-out insurance giant paid bonuses totaling $165 million to 
employees, including traders in the Financial Products unit that 
nearly took the company and the U.S. financial system to the brink of 
collapse.

AIG has received $182.5 billion in federal bailout money and is now 
80 percent government-owned.

Populist anger led the House to pass a bill that would impose a 90 
percent tax on bonuses given to employees with family incomes above 
$250,000 at AIG and other companies that have received at least $5 
billion in government bailout money. It would apply to any such 
bonuses issued since Dec. 31.

Obama and his top advisers called the bonuses outrageous and 
condemned them. Bernstein said the administration must be focused on 
the big picture, not just one company.

"What happened at AIG, vis-a-vis these bonuses, is a symptom of a 
much larger problem," he said. "And we cannot lose sight of the 
larger problem, which is stabilizing financial markets,"

On Saturday, a busload of activists representing working- and 
middle-class families paid visits to the lavish homes of AIG 
executives in Connecticut to protest the bonuses awarded by the 
struggling insurance company.

About 40 protesters sought to urge AIG executives who received a 
portion of the $165 million in bonuses to do more to help families.

American International Group Inc. has said it was contractually 
obligated to give the retention bonuses, payments designed to keep 
valued employees from quitting, to people in its financial products 
unit, based in Wilton, Connecticut.

AIG chairman Edward Liddy has urged any executive who received more 
than $100,000 in bonus payments to return at least half. He told a 
House subcommittee last week that some of the executives have 
"already stepped forward and returned 100 percent."

AIG has argued that retention bonuses are crucial to pulling the 
company out of its crisis. Without the bonuses, the company says, top 
employees who best understand AIG's business would leave.

"We think $165 million could be used in a more appropriate way to 
keep people in their homes, create more jobs and health care," said 
protester Emeline Bravo-Blackport, a gardener.

Another protester, Claire Jeffery, of Bloomfield, said she's on the 
verge of foreclosure. She works as a housekeeper; her husband, a 
truck driver, can't find work.

"I love my home," she said. "I really want people to help us."

The company, in response to the protests, said all its employees were 
"working very hard to pay back the government and help the U.S. 
economy recover."

"The people working at AIG today are part of the solution, not part 
of the problem," company spokeswoman Christina Pretto said in an 
e-mailed statement.

The group also protested at the office of AIG's financial products 
division in Wilton, where they waved signs and chanted, "Money for 
the needy, not for the greedy!"

There were no arrests.

Bernstein spoke on ABC television's "This Week." Goolsbee appeared on 
CBS' "Face the Nation." Gregg appeared on CNN's "State of the Union."
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This 
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

-- 
"Capitalism teaches the people the moral conceptions of cannibalism 
are the strong devouring the weak; its theory of the world of men and 
women is that of a glorified pig-trough where the biggest swine gets 
the most swill." -James Connolly 1910.

Richard Mellor
AFSCME Local 444 retired
Oakland CA
http://weknowwhatsup.blogspot.com/
http://www.myspace.com/unionguy510
http://www.clnews.org

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