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Obama Received a $101,332 Bonus from AIG

By: Dan Spencer (Diary)  |  March 17th, 2009 at 01:44 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

Senator Barack Obama received a $101,332 bonus from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets.org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. are – Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama.

The A.I.G. Financial Products affiliate of A.I.G. gave out $136,928, the most of any AIG affiliate, in the 2008 cycle.  I would note that A.I.G.’s financial products division is the unit that wrote trillions of dollars’ worth of credit-default swaps and “misjudged” the risk.

The Washington Post reports a “mob effect” at A.I.G financial products division:

A tidal wave of public outrage over bonus payments swamped American International Group yesterday. Hired guards stood watch outside the suburban Connecticut offices of AIG Financial Products, the division whose exotic derivatives brought the insurance giant to the brink of collapse last year. Inside, death threats and angry letters flooded e-mail inboxes. Irate callers lit up the phone lines. Senior managers submitted their resignations. Some employees didn’t show up at all.

With the anger and rage that is being exhibited against A.I.G., perhaps the bonuses Obama received from A.I.G. explain Obama’s A.I.G crocodile tears.

Now that the Wall street Journal has revealed that A.I.G. paid bonuses of $1 million or more to 73 employees, it’s time to ask if recipients of A.I.G. “bonuses,” including President Obama, will give back what now ought to be taxpayer money?

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  • larryp

    from AIG and it is pretty big, why not cash it out or move it around, and leave town for Belize or Costa Rica. A lot of those countries had “Economic citizenship” for not too much relative to the size of he bonus.
    It’d be better to go than to give it back Partic when the regulators are such scum and phonies.

  • Jack_Savage

    And other Democrat controlled bailout whores / investment banks that funneled hundreds of millions to Obama.

  • icbm

    This little story is bad enough, but one really has to start wondering, in light of Obama’s other “bonuses” from, say, Fannie and Freddie, among others: how is it that the (very) junior senator from Illinois managed to obtain such massive contributions, far larger than almost all other senators?

  • icbm

    up by some major outlets. it’s a big story.

    • Mike gamecock DeVine
      • Alitheia

        The solution is to buy them up ourselves.

  • Flagstaff

    **Now that the Wall street Journal has revealed that A.I.G. paid bonuses of $1 million or more to 73 employees, it?s time to ask if recipients of A.I.G. ?bonuses,? including President Obama, will give back what now ought to be taxpayer money?**

    I’m getting a bad feeling about all the invective being hurled at a generalized target. It doesn’t surprise me that Democrats are ready to shout “unfair!” at unnamed Wall Street ‘executives’ because of appearances, but I’m appalled that conservatives are agreeing with them, apparently without thinking.

    The only factual statement I’ve heard today is that the recipients of the bonuses had agreed to stay on with AIG in 2008 in return for bonuses equivalent to what they received the previous year. They’re more like deferred compensation than real bonuses. If this is true, what is the complaint about? Their bonuses were a corporate obligation at that point, just like its property tax bills and pension plan liabilities were.

    Furthermore, do we know that the bonuses weren’t deserved, anyway? It seems to me that the main objections being voiced are that they are just BIG.

    Do we really want the power of government sanctions being targeted at a few hundred private citizens who made a bargain with their employer two years ago, just because we’re blindly railing at their employer and we’ve subsequently bought the company? Chuckie Schumer is threatening to tax them all away as punishment. Frightening use of the power to tax.

    A word of caution: If you find yourself agreeing with a flaming liberal during the heat of the moment, be careful that you aren’t overlooking some of your basic principles.

    • janis

      about this stuff, particularly when some of it so convoluted and so misreported that it’s hard to know what is actually going on. This is the time when it’s crucial to really hang onto those conservative principles and filter the “news” through same. That’s why Rush is so valuable in these instances as he never lets the way the media portrays this stuff to stand as the ultimate truth.

      • Flagstaff

        I was wrong. He got it just right, from a different perspective.

        • janis

          I’ve listened to him a little, but I guess I’m usually listening to some other station when he comes on these days.

          • Flagstaff

            it was that we are straining at this gnat as our attention is diverted from the camel that is the remaining 99.9% of this gigantic government folly.

            Glenn is never one to pass up a chance to assign nefarious intent to anything he doesn’t like. In this case, he may be right.

            I’m surprised that even Larry Kudlow has bought into the populism of demanding “the return of the people’s money” by the bonus recipients.

            And I understand that Schumer’s scheme is called a Bill of Attainder, and is forbidden by the Constitution. New proof the Schumer is the exact type of scoundrel that the Founders wanted to protect us from.

          • janis

            to the money that various constituent groups received, such as ACORN, the bonuses were fairly small. As to Larry Kudlow, he’s of a piece with Mitch McConnell and even Eric Cantor who are both jumping on board the “get the money back” train or, at the least, making sure this doesn’t happen again. Of course, that’s what happens when a bill is passed and no one knows what’s in it until it’s too late.

            As for Schumer, the fires of hell aren’t hot enough for him, Dodd, and Barney Franks. They all have such a surplus of gall to be out in public flapping their jaws with such utter duplicity when they are in this thing hip-deep.

  • Flagstaff

    Let’s see if he gets it right. I don’t expect that he will, although I like Glenn in general.

  • johnt

    AIG this week, G W Bush in between and always. Feed the hate, divide the nation, pick an enemy, divert the attention of those with twenty second spans, It’s as old as the French Revolution, refined in the 20th Century, and who says David Axelrod, the Rat, Rahm Emanuel, and our first dictator-in- his- heart, the Big O , can’t learn.
    Too bad it’s from the bottom of the moral and historical barrel.

    The left, wise and caring as always, is loving it. Sorry we’re in you’re way Left, be careful !!

  • Vladimir
  • tedpomeroy

    As I read it Hank Greenberg bought influence on both side with contributions.

    Why did hatchet man Ellliot Spitzer go after Greenberg at AIG in 2004 and how did AIG’s “giving” change after that?

    I smell Schumer!

  • jamesdandy

    How much of the $101k was PAC money and how much came from individuals who happened to work for AIG?

  • arel

    the bonuses are legally binding and governement shouldn’t be able to screw with contracts between buisnesses and private citizens; that is something that seperates us from Socialists, and they shouldn’t be able to tax them 90% either. The government is who caused AIG’s failure if you really want to blame someone. When over the last 20 years AIG has been mandated by government to have 55% of its loans going out to those they know can’t afford it what does anyone expect from AIG? If the government (Bill Clinton, George W and even that previously served as President) had not made it “possible for everyone to own a home” we wouldn’t be in this mess right now. How about we put together a bi partisan group and investigate why AIG actually failed? I think they will find the ones to blame are in Washinton DC.
    As for those receiving bonuses pay them it was part of a binding contract maybe they will choose to do the right thing and no take them but I doubt it. I have a bigger problem with AIG sending billions to banks not in our country to the tune of billions.

  • 1stRichard

    Yes, some of those that received AIG bonuses?.

    Dodd, Chris $103,100.00

    Obama, Barack $101,332.00

    Clinton, Hillary $35,965.00

    Baucus, Max $24,750.00

    Romney, Mitt $20,850.00

    Larson, John B $19,750.00

    Sununu, John E $18,500.00

    Neal, Richard E $6,500.00

    Goldman Sachs got the largest chunk of U.S. taxpayer money

    Some of those that received Goldman Sachs bonuses

    Obama, Barack $955,473

    Clinton, Hillary $405,750

    Kerry John $308,250

    Romney, Mitt $229,675

    Dodd, Chris $110,000

    Edwards, John $66,450

    Specter, Arlen $47,600

    Emanuel, Rahm $37,750