[439] in Privacy_Forum
[ PRIVACY Forum ] Chilling Chaos in Congress Over AIG Bonuses
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (privacy@vortex.com)
Thu Mar 19 15:02:21 2009
Date: Thu, 19 Mar 2009 11:46:50 -0700
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Chilling Chaos in Congress Over AIG Bonuses
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000523.html
Greetings. I can't be the only person feeling increasingly disturbed
by Congress' reaction to the obnoxious AIG bonuses controversy.
I believe we all pretty much agree that the bonuses were utterly
inappropriate to be contracted when they were ... but the fact is that
they *were* contracted, and work was done on the basis of those
contracts (much of which is now completed, and the relevant persons
departed as planned). We now know it was the Obama Treasury Department
that requested the language honoring those bonuses (despite righteous
indignation we're hearing now from the administration about the
bonuses -- after the story blew up).
It's particularly chilling to hear Congress talking about special
targeted 90% or 95% taxes to try suck back the bonuses from
individuals at this stage of the game (the House is about to pass
something along these lines as I type this). Certainly it is
completely appropriate to recover the funds from AIG, but
retroactively going after the individuals who worked under legal
contract terms -- in expectation of being paid under those terms --
seems to me to set a terrible precedent.
Also very disturbing -- some Congressmen have called for publication
of AIG employees' personal information, even in the face of death
threats against those employees and their families. Emotions are
running wild over logic.
I'm a big supporter of Obama, but the AIG situation seems to me to
have become overly personalized, and now members of Congress are
trying to out posture each other with "get tough" reactions, some of
which seem to be very poorly thought out (surprise! surprise!) and
could do even more damage.
Am I alone in thinking that the situation is becoming chaotic, with
many of the negative ramifications associated with such chaos?
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren@vortex.com
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
- People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad
- Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, GCTIP - Global Coalition
for Transparent Internet Performance - http://www.gctip.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
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