In today's news, Barack Obama threw a hissy fit over the AIG bonuses. We already know that our President is not a big fan of executive compensation and bonuses, but today he flipped his lid. AIG is planning to pay out over 165 million dollars in bonuses, while receiving nearly 150 billion dollars in government funds. AIG is a quasi-private/public institution that only exists in it current form because of bail-out dollars. Our President is upset that this government funded "company" is paying out $165 million dollars in bonuses. In fact, Obama has claimed that he will stop this "reckless and greedy" company from paying out bonuses. There is only one, sorta kinda big problem with Obama's statement. The bonuses are contractually agreed upon. Or in other words, AIG is legally bound to pay out bonuses that were established before financial troubles occurred. Barack is aware of this, but vows to stop them anyways. Realistically, who knows whether the bonuses will help retain the remaining talent at AIG, or simply waste millions of dollars. At the end of the day, contracts are legally binding, and Barack doesn't seem to care.
Barack Obama's blatant disregard for legally binding contracts shouldn't come as a surprise. His 275 billion dollar housing bailout calls for judges to rewrite loans if lenders refuse to rewrite loan terms, clearly ignoring the legal power of contracts. Barack's refusal to respect contractual obligations always stems from the same motive; economic equality. He doesn't care if bonuses are awarded to productive employees, if AIG is contractually bound to pay them, or if a lender believes a loan can be repaid at its agreed upon rate, Barack wants economic equality, and for that he will sacrifice legal equality.
Before the government "invested" billions of our dollars they should have read the fine print. They should have seen the guarantees and obligations. Then again, maybe they did and just didn't care.
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