WILL THE POLITICIANS GIVE BACK THEIR AIG BONUSES?

This morning your Commander was in deep contemplation when he came up with the politically related question noted above.

The other day I heard that many elected officials in Washington had received political contributions from AIG, so I went to Google to secure some substantiation. Shockingly, I learned that your Commander and the Huffington Post are on the same page on this interesting question. Jamie Court reported that AIG gave $9.3 million over the last decade in political contributions, and they were split 50/50 between Republicans and Democrats.

Here is a list of recent recipients:

Senator Barack Obama $104,332
Senator Chris Dodd $103,900
Senator John McCain $ 59,499
Senator Hillary Clinton $ 37,965
Senator Max Baucus $ 24,750
Candidate Mitt Romney $ 20,850
Senator Joe Biden $ 19,975
House John B. Larson $ 19,750
Senator John Sununu $ 18,500
Candidate Rudolph Giuliani $ 13,200
House Paul E. Kanjorski $ 12,000
Senator Dick Durbin $ 11,000
House Edwin Perlmutter $ 10,500
House Charles Rangel $ 9,000
Candidate John Edwards $ 7,850
Senator Bob Corker $ 7,400
House Chris Smith $ 6,900
House Richard Neal $ 6,500
Senator Jay Rockefeller $ 6,500
Senator Jack Reed $ 6,000

This certainly is a very interesting list of names, which makes this subject one of major conflicting relationships. The House of Representatives passed retroactive legislation requiring employees who were given contractually promised bonuses from companies that received government TARP money to repay them or pay a 90% tax. The Senate has yet to vote on similar legislation. The question is: Wouldn’t it be appropriate for politicians who received campaign contributions from AIG and other TARP recipients several months ago return those funds to the companies, or to the government?

Remember, politicians returned monies they received from Enron to charities after that scandal broke, so should they not do the same with AIG.

I hope you know how much it pains your Commander to agree with anything suggested in the Huffington Post. Already President Obama is making noise that he has concerns about the 90% tax proposal, so it should be very interesting to see the political dance as it unfolds in the coming days and weeks. Are we experiencing CHANGE and TRANSPARENCY or just a cunning political plot?

COMMANDER GRANGER