No way should they be given bonuses for running their financial "expertise" in the toilet.  I strongly will urge Congress and the President to get this money back from AIG.  This is deplorable and definitely they need to be held accountable.

I think ANY company that gets bailed out by government should be responsible to keep track of where their money they got goes to. 

I think its wrong for people to abuse the tax payers money like its water.  From taking bonus’s when other companies are cutting back people’s paychecks (and you still get stuck with insurance and medical costs) and they worry if tomorrow they still have a job. 

Even the schools are slicing staff and closing down schools. 

So when I hear about oh poor so and so, he can’t live his old way….I’m thinking, be thankful he still has a roof over his head.  And when they start being forced to eat NON-named brand canned foods, and are worried about the prices of lunches at their children’s schools. THEN I’ll have some sympathy for them.

I’ve lived through a business downsizing and my husband out of work for a year and a half where we lost our home to foreclosure (because of around Katrina time, the paperwork didn’t get back in time to say that we were refinanced).

Each day I give thanks that we’re still a family.  Through thick and thin.

If anything I think instead of just brushing it under the rug with AIG and other companies like that, they should clean out and get rid of some of those upper managements that obviously are so caughted up in their own little world not seeing about those who work so hard UNDER them doing most the work that is trying to keep their company afloat.

I’ll get off my soapbox now. :sighs:  But seriously, AIG and any corporate that filled with corruption REALLY needs to be forced to pay back the money.

 As for blaming it on Obama, remember this mess is what he was DUMPED with from how many years of other people’s mistakes? So, before blaming him.  Do your homework.  He just got into the job.  It can’t be fixed over night.

I think personally if it is said "IT TAKES A VILLAGE TO RAISE A CHILD".  I think it takes the PEOPLE of this NATION to work side by side even if it is sweat work, to help REBUILD this United States.

Not one person put us here, but we all shouldn’t be so much better than our neighbor that we can’t work together to start making even small steps in correcting it at basically GROUND ZERO.

We’ve been cleaning up after people in power for how long now?  Why stop now?  This time though, make your voices heard through congress, your congressman, your representatives, who ever it takes.

You put these people in office.  Don’t talk about it, DO something about it.  People in power usually don’t have any thoughts about worrying about what they see in the mirror each day.

It’s people like us who have a conscious.

I would like someone to explain to me how a company rewards people for practices that have forced the company to the brink of bankruptcy?  Have times changed so much that you get paid for not doing your job?

I hesitate to copy an article but you all gotta read this one (link below):

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-black-tom-ferguson-rob-johnson-walker-todd/how-to-stop-aigs-bonuses_b_175351.html

How to Stop AIG’s Bonuses

By William K. Black, Thomas Ferguson, Robert Johnson, and Walker Todd

AIG’s decision to pay out at least a hundred and sixty five million dollars in bonuses takes the bank bailout program’s abuse of the public trust to a whole new level.

This act simply cannot be allowed to stand. The only question is how to stop it.

"Sanctity of contracts" has for some time been TARP’s equivalent of Harry Potter’s magic wand, the thing you waved to make difficulties disappear (for financiers, of course; if you are an ordinary worker with a pension contract, by contrast, the magic doesn’t work for you). AIG clearly takes the Treasury, the Federal Reserve, and the Obama administration for fools, who can be counted on to roll over yet again at the first whisper of the magic words. There is no reason for agents of the people of the United States, whose money AIG plays with, to be so sheep-like. Remember that this is a firm that is 79.9% owned by the United States government. It is therefore quite possible to abort this outrage by decisive exercise of public authority. Within existing law, there is more than one way to do it, but a direct solution is readily at hand: Firstly, the US trustees in charge of the firm must immediately instruct the corporate treasurer to make no payments of any bonuses. They also need to order him to issue stop payment orders on any checks that fly out the door at the last minute, as with Merrill Lynch. Then the trustees need to split off the derivatives unit from the rest of the firm and separately incorporate it. This step leaves AIG’s other businesses free to operate as usual. If the recipients of the bonuses refuse to waive them, then the derivatives unit should at once be thrown into bankruptcy, terminating all obligations to pay them. Right now, press reports suggest that the firm’s top management waited until the last minute to inform the government of what was happening. AIG CEO Edward Liddy, accordingly, should be asked to resign at once, for the sake of public confidence and to send a clear signal that gaming the system is unacceptable. It is also past time for an investigation of the validity of AIG’s past accounting and securities disclosures and its executive compensation program by the Office of Thrift Supervision, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the FBI.This leaves open the question of how to deal with all other obligations of the derivatives unit, including the notorious credit default swaps. We, like most independent analysts, are mystified by the determination of the Federal Reserve and Treasury to keep paying these off at 100% of their face value. But that’s an issue for tomorrow. Today the task is to stop a grotesque abuse before it is too late. The path we outline here would do it, without throwing markets into turmoil. Nothing less than public confidence in the United States government as a whole is now at stake. 

Help, y’all!  Researching on-line last night, I came across an article on these bogus AIG "bonuses" which stated that not only will these be given, but another batch will be issued in July.  Has anyone else encountered this information?  I can’t find the piece today.