Obama Calls Wall Street Bonuses 'Shameful' and the 'Height of Irresponsibility' -- But Unclear How Stern He Was With CEO's During Visit Earlier This Week

Shameful? Height of Irresponsibility?
How can Robert Gibbs stand before the American people and push a stimulus that everyone knows will cripple this Nation for generations on one hand, and talk 'outrage' at Wall Street on the other?
The hypocrisy continues to compound -- exponentially!

The Borgen Project has some good info on the cost of addressing global poverty.

$30 billion: Annual shortfall to end world hunger.
$550 billion: U.S. Defense budget

the only solace is that "A FOOL AND HIS MONEY ARE SOON PARTED"

we can only hope!!!

President Obama;

Good on you! and the time has come for CEO's to realise that companies and institutions need to show some form of responsibility if they want to practice and sustain economic, social and environmental accountabilities. CEO should not just preach cost cutting while they are irresponsible themselves and have "no shame" to pay themselves handsomely especially in times where the world tends to face financial crisis. Instead what CEO's should be doing is helping the President to manage the financial crisis by contributing financial help to solve what their country is facing! Obama stating

"What we're going to need is for the folks on Wall Street who are asking for help to show some restraint, and show some discipline, and show some sense of responsibility," he said is correct and I strongly support this so should responsible citizens too!

Why do people on Wall Street need "over the top" bonus? What would happen to the billions in bonus's if not given to those over paid Wall street types? Would it be filtered into the economy or what? How can one segment of society be soooooo rich and yet a policeman, firefighter, nurse, teacher, etc have to fight for for their wages that barely pay their bills?

Democrat Franklin Raines ran Fannie Mae and collected $50 million.

Democrat Jamie Gorelick worked for Fannie Mae and took home $26 million.

Democrat Jim Johnson hauled in millions from his Fannie Mae CEO job. From Wikipedia: "A 2006 OFHEO report found that Fannie Mae had substantially under-reported Johnson's compensation. Originally reported as $6-7 million, Johnson actually received approximately $21 million."

Notice a pattern here?

All contributed to the cooking of Fannie Mae's books. All were protected by Barney Frank and Chris Dodd. They were all complicit in creating the subprime lending disaster, which kicked off the credit crisis.

If Obama were really "outraged" about corruption, he'd start with righting the wrongs at Fannie Mae. But he won't because the corruption was caused by his own cronies (and even advisors in the case of Raines). So he misdirects the public and moves on to Wall Street. And the mainstream media goes along with it.

These CEOs make me sick. Any company who took part in receiving any money from the stimulus package shouldn't be allowed to buy "toys" and/or give/recieve massive bonuses. They took part in a socialist program, therefore the government should have some say what is going on inside their companies. I hate the fact that I am a recent college graduate busting my butt to find a job and trying to makes ends meet, yet our tax dollars are allowing these men to give themselves these huge bonuses. Not ok.

I'll bet you dollars to donuts Obama made that statement AFTER he got his bonus!

Anybody know why ABC, CBS, and NBC aren't fully covering the stimulus issues?? I haven't heard any of them mention the "$150M on honey bee insurance" or the "$20M on Fish Barriers" etc. (I'm not kidding about those - they really are included in the "pork-ulus package"!) Anyone been seeing this on TV???

Spazzy3...you're RIGHT! I bet if enough of us SCREAMED at our leaders and demanded that they fire Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and every other elected official who allowed this, then the CEOs of those companies would act muuuuch differently.... Heck, they might even pay some of it back. (hey, I can hope, right?) ;-)

brighteyes...just how much $$$ do you think you're going to get in stimulus??

Many of us need jobs to pay our mortgages ... not a silly "drop-in-the-bucket" stimulus check. And...if I did get a check, I'd have to use it to pay my utilities or buy food. That doesn't stimulate anything.

If it's just cash you're after, then maybe Obamer should just divide the $1.3 trillion by the number of LEGAL Americans and everyone gets that amount. Probably $17K each....

These CEO's/executives need to be taken to the woodshed! We need to take away all of their "toys" and priveleges plus jail time and pay back what they have stolen from the American people. These jerks will just keep on spending the money as long as it is there and being fed to them.

I think you're spot on Tina!!!

I wonder if Obama will hold Barney Frank and Chris Dodd accountable for their negligence and incompetence resulting from the banking collapse? They're still getting paid and have jobs. Hmmm... I smell a double standard here...

"I have a friend who is reading "Dreams of My Father". Her impression is that for the first time in our history, we have a president who actually hates his country."

Right wingers love this country like an abusive husband "loves" his wife.

Sure there's real emotion there but the way its expressed is horrifying.

I have a suggestion that would help the economy. Look at the bonus records for the CEOs of the failing businesses. They can keep the bonuses for the years their company was actually in the black with no layoffs. The rest of their bonuses must be given back to the company and used to hire back the employees that have lost jobs. There we go.

And while we're at it - how about Congress takes a paycut?? They get paid from taxes - which we pay. When a business can't afford it -pay cuts happen - and taxpayers are definitely unable to afford it right now! I'm thinking that would be a hefty chunk of money to put toward unemployment benefits and helping people get back to work. Sooner or later they will have to realize that unemployed taxpayers mean no money coming in - so where are these billions coming from??

As for the mortgage industry - just reset the mortgage interest rates back to what they were when these people got the mortgage and could afford the payments. It's not really fair to those of us who were smart enough to make sure we could PAY for the house before we bought it - but at least if you get the payments back down - they'll be paying for the house and keeping it - and help our property values - instead of foreclosures and abandoning the homes. Yes, they should've realized that the rates would eventually go up - but since we can't put the "stuff" back in the horse - at least we might be able to stop it from leaking out.

I have a friend who is reading "Dreams of My Father". Her impression is that for the first time in our history, we have a president who actually hates his country. I'll reserve opinion until I read it for myself. I hope she's wrong.

Battery Park would adequately serve as La Place de la Concord redux

his presidency isn't two weeks old, and already warning flags have gone up.

Obama is wallpapering his administration with lobbyists, installed a tax cheat to run the Treasury Department and is pushing Congress to pass a massive, wildly unaffordable "stimulus" bill loaded with pork and reckless spending that plunges Americans even deeper into debt.

Even worse, the bill every day looks more like 15 years of pent-up big-government liberalism than an economic "stimulus" plan.

Ever since his election, many Americans have wondered which Barack Obama would show up at the White House: the most liberal member of the Senate or the post-partisan bearer of change we could all believe in.

One thing is clear: His "stimulus" bill is not change we can believe in. It's a return to big-government welfare that we will choke on.

Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd has been in typically indignant form this week, opining on the financial crisis. Before his Tuesday hearing on Bernard Madoff, he demanded that regulators get to the bottom of any crime: “American investors deserve an explanation and the responsible parties must be held accountable!” And yesterday the Connecticut Senator denounced Wall Street bonuses and said, “I am urging — in fact, not urging, demanding — that the Treasury Department figures out some way to get the money back.”

Pardon us, Senator, but how about taking your own advice?

We refer to his promise to release mortgage documents for the two properties that he and his wife refinanced with Countrywide Financial in 2003. In June a former Countrywide loan officer charged that Mr. Dodd received preferential rates and had fees waived on those loans as part of a VIP program the company had for “friends” of the company’s then-CEO Angelo Mozilo. Mr. Dodd first issued a denial and then, days later, acknowledged that he was a “VIP” with Countrywide but said he thought it was “more of a courtesy.” In late June he pledged to make all pertinent documents public “at some point.” We’re still waiting.