“We have the ability. I know that I am telling people we are allowed to,” he said. “What I don’t know is if people (employees) are willing to. A lot of them feel hurt, embarrassed, a lot of people have lived in fear because of what I call lynch mobs with pitchforks.”
Benmosche was referring to severe criticism of the bonuses paid to some AIG staff at the financial products unit at the center of its meltdown. The verbal assaults by politicians and in the media led to several demonstrations, including a bus tour of employee homes near the unit’s Wilton, Connecticut headquarters, and threats to others.
“People think it is funny but it is not when it is your children,” he continued, his voice rising in anger. “It is not when you come home and you find people in front of your home and you had to sneak your children out in the middle of the night so that they are not attacked in a country called America.”
“It was wrong. I think that when you do that, when you incite that kind of feeling in people, it makes it difficult to come to work the next day and say ‘I’m going to work hard.’”
*sniff*
# 20 pedro,
Excellent!!!!
The Gov should now sell it’s stocks in AIG and use the profits to pay for health care and War!!!!!
I think Ted Kennedy would have loved that.
#6 they are lower than the scum on a worms belly….
..hee,hee, well said.
# 22 electrohead,
How low are they?
Benmosche and his cohorts should be in jail.
#21 I think Bernanke is in charge of that transaction… NOT!
# 14 noname said,
“If I have a million dollars that I offer as a loan, complete with contracts, repayment schedules and such, then; I loan it to someone I know can’t pay it back, whose fault is it??”
Barney Frank?
Sure. He is right. But I have no sympathy for him. They got themselves into this situation. But that doesn’t make people threatening his family NOR invading his privacy / trespassing right either.
Still, just move the family to that second home. I’m sure their tears will dry before before my bank account does. But not much more since you’ll gladly take money that could have helped my family. Sometimes it’s hard to balance the weight of different wrongs but sometimes it’s not so hard.
#14, noname,
I understand where you are on this and don’t disagree. Just to highlight AIG’s problem though.
AIG is an insurance company. When loans are made, prudent lenders buy insurance in case the borrower does default. AIG insured many of those loans. AIG did not make any loans.
When all the derivatives and truly toxic loans were going around, AIG saw them as highly profitable. When these loans started failing, AIG was now on the hook to pay the lenders the default insurance. Only there were so many failures and they came so quickly AIG could not pay all the claims. AIG had more claims than money.
It was AIG’s failure to pay these defaults that put pressure on the lenders, mostly big banks like Citi, BoA, Morgan Stanley, Merril Lynch, Goldman Sachs, Lyman Brothers, and others heavily involved.
I think AIG has received over $200 billion in bailout funds to pay off the insurance claims. The bonuses that raised all the fuss a little while ago were to the division that is winding up all the claims for the defaults. Apparently they are the only people on earth who can figure out the details.
I think you know the rest of the story.
#27, gm,
I’m not so sure about that. Benmosche started at CEO a couple of weeks ago and still has yet to show up at the office. He is on vacation in his Croatian wine villa.
But as someone else said. What about all those who lost their homes because of the financial mess AIG was a full part of? Don’t they count?
Well, the point of the matter is, if they can’t reimburse the insured loans, they sure as hell don’t need to be passing out bonuses left and right, bailout be damned. I’m surely not condoning curbside riots or violence by any measure, but something needs to be done to help pull their heads out of their backsides. Protesters need to stop fanning the flames with their hostile tactics and making these people look like the victims.
If he would only fall on his sword, and give self-immolation a try, I’d forgive this CEO. As it is though, he and his chums look kind of like mafia thugs.
Aux armes, citoyens,
Formez vos bataillons,
Marchons, marchons !
Qu’un sang impur
Abreuve nos sillons !
Ok.
WHO here thinks $100,000 per year is GOOOOD MONEY??
To these folks that amount is being POOR.
To these folks, the Wash person in the bathroom MAKES MORE MONEY then that.
To these folks, WASHING a car is a waste of water, so they BUY a new car.
To these folks, it is better to have a House in Every City then to spend a NITE in a Hotel 6.
To these folks, IF it dont require my VISA to pay for the meal, then Why am I sitting here.
Pocket change to these folks, is a $100 tip for a meal.
To these folks, Washing clothes is a waste of time, when you can wear a NEW one every day, at $600-3000 per suit.
To arms, citizens,
Form your battalions,
Walk, walk!
Impure blood
Water our furrows!
# 28 Mr. Fusion,
I fully agree with what you typed.
My point when I wrote “they caused this”, is that they caused their own pain.
Yes, they did not issue the loans. However, the “regular joe” is consistently told they have to bear the burden of their and their companies bad financial decisions.
And, the “regular joe” does bear these burdens from bad financial decisions, their own and their companies.
Now that the global economy has tanked because of Wall Street Greed, the “regular joe” now has to bear the burden for, their own and their companies and Wall Streets bad bad financial decisions.
At what point does the “regular joe” just go under. And when the “regular joe” does go under, what will that do to the Global economy?
The two different political approaches have been::
Republican’s want to blame the “regular joe” for causing this. They say, he should have never taken the loans regardless of how much cajoling, reassuring and lying CountryWide and other did.
Democrats want to fix the mess Republican’s caused, better regulate Wall Street, reform bankruptcy laws and bring jobs back so the “regular joe” can fix this through democratic action.
Do I believe that the Democrats will fix the laws to fix our economy in fairness and the best way possible, NO.
However, I feel the Democrats are better positioned to do more good then the Republican are.
We gave the Republicans more then 8 years; Reagan (8), BushI(4), Clinton (8), BushII(8). The economy during all that time soared under Clinton.
The seeds for this countries economic destruction began with repeal of
Repeal of usury laws::
In 1978, the Supreme Court changed everything. In Marquette National Bank v. First of Omaha Corp., it ruled that a national bank can charge its customers, no matter where they are located, interest at the rate allowed by the state in which it is located.
Electing Ronald Reagan, hero of US conservatism::
‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’” Thus quipped Ronald Reagan.
Alan Greenspan’s understanding of::
“Governments bad; deregulated markets good”: who later described himself, in congressional testimony, as being “in a state of shocked disbelief” over the failure of the “self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholders’ equity”?
……..
#35, noname,
Yup. Well put.
Want business reform??
FIX THE LLC license, which was ONLY for small startups, NOT CORPS.
LLC= limited liability Corporation. sO YOU CANT sue THE PERSONS, only the corp.
@Carcarius said,
“The CEO can go ‘F’ himself. Pardon my French”
Umm, that’s British (19th century legal anagram), M’lord.
As for most of the rest of you, he was asking that the normal worker and their children be left alone.
Or is it the position of the average USA citizen that the children take on the fault of their fathers?