WTF? Doesn’t anyone hear that alarm going off???
Hello? There’s an alarm shrieking. Is no one paying attention? The House has approved a NINETY PERCENT TAX for the sole purpose of punishing a corporation whose executives annoy us.
Folks. The federal income tax is not intended to be used as a bludgeon.It may be against the law to use it that way.
This is a disaster for America, far worse than any economic recession could be.
Make no mistake about it. The powers that put George W. Bush in office will be back. This precedent will give them a handy-dandy tool to use against people they don’t like. And who knows? One of those people could be you or me.
That’s the whole issue about the rule of law. It’s supposed to protect everyone, not just people we don’t like.
The Times reports that “Democrats and some Republicans said the tax on bonuses for traders, executives, and bankers earning more than $250,000 was the quickest way to show angry Americans that Congress intended to recoup the extra dollars.”
“Quickest way?” We call that expedience. Another term could be stone stupidity. It’s every bit as stupid and arrogant as the Bushite theory that if a president says something, that makes it legal.
I don’t like AIG’s actions any more than the rest of us do. But that doesn’t justify trashing the Constitution in a fit of pique. There’s gotta be a better way.
This one is going to come back to bite. In a big way.
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8 Responses to “WTF? Doesn’t anyone hear that alarm going off???”
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I’m of two minds on this. One the one hand, if the government taxed away my bonus, I’d be ready to riot in the streets. It just seems like there’s something fundamentally wrong with the government interfering in private companies this way. And the precedent it sets is worrying. (What, I wonder, stopped them from doing the same thing to GMs unionized workers? Tax the heck out of them to make up for the fact that they had to give GM billions?)
On the other hand, these companies did receive a government bailout. Maybe this will serve as a valuable lesson to companies in the future: don’t screw up so badly that you require Uncle Sam’s money, or the government will start sticking its (really big) nose in your business, and you will not like the results.
I am rather dismayed about this massive tax on bonuses. It’s a ridiculous over-reaction. And further proof that our lawmakers have left the rational thought behind and are bent on making huge gestures in an effort at appeasement. Although it is a nice change that they are trying to appease the public, rather than Wall Street cronies…
I suppose I agree that this was not done properly, but….we are 80% owners of that company. I think we’re getting a glimpse of the sense of entitlement and no-consequences that was–and perhaps still is–business as usual on Wall Street.
I think it was a cynical move by congress people to “vote” to punish AIG – it will never be found constitutional and they’re off the hook with their constituents, after all, they voted to punish.
I am a raving liberal, but I heard a conservative (way conservative) Texas Representative (forgot his name) on NPR yesterday who made a number of smart suggestions of excellent ways to get back the bonuses that would be legal and constitutional.
For example, one is to force the company into receivership – since we are 80 percent owners we can do that – and then all assets and payouts up to a year ago can be claimed back. They ignored him. He asked, and I’m wondering too, why this option was not pursued since it would stand up in court? I’m guessing it was a deeply expedient move and they don’t really want to get the money back.
More will be revealed, I guess.
I could not agree with you more. This is unconstitutional and just not good sense. AIG – and effectively us – will spend millions in legal fees and court costs trying to apply this tax, and we’ll lose anyway.
Bad decision.
Wow. I’m ashamed to say that I hadn’t even thought about the ramifications. Guess I’m too distracted.
But you’re right. It’s the whole slippery slope mentality.
I don’t understand why you say this precedence will give he Republicans something to use???? It is a democrat in the WH that is allowing it? Seems to me that the Republicans NEVER went this far.
@ Cathy: It certainly seems extreme to me, too!
To my mind, one class of people the Dems see as “the enemy” (possibly too strong a word for it) are the greedy corporate interests that engineered and then took advantage of lax regulation so they could engage in questionable dealings that, many observers think, brought down the economy. Slapping an absurd and probably illegal tax on a few such people is an outrageous abuse of governmental power.
If this scheme stands, one day it will be there to be used against those of us who represent “the enemy” to people who oppose women’s reproductive rights, separation of science education from religious belief in schools, environmental protection, universal health care, and the like.
But actually, when it comes to going too far, IMHO lying to the American public to get us into an unjust war that has killed over 4,000 Americans and something between 100,000 and a million Iraqis (depending on who you believe) takes the cake. Blithely ignoring the Geneva conventions, dispensing with habeas corpus, and torturing prisoners far exceed whacking a bunch of greedy corporate executives with a tax that probably will be struck down in court.
The set who took power during the Bush II administration (I hesitate to label them solely as “Republicans,” because I do believe — I hope — they don’t represent the decent Americans who belong to that party) showed us that they were not people of good will. That is what makes me think that when they regain power (which they will), they will use every precedent set by the Obama administration against those they regard as their enemies. And, my friends, too many of their “enemies” are ordinary Americans who don’t happen to agree with their thinking.