Bonuses and Socialism

Funny how the view from the higher windows on Wall Street varies from those approximating Main Street. You have got to love the mindset that leads to a statement like this:

“I think President Obama painted everyone with a broad stroke,” said Brian McCaffrey, 55, a Wall Street lawyer who was on his way to see a client. “The way we pay our taxes is bonuses. The only way that we’ll get any of our bailout money back is from taxes on bonuses. I think bonuses should be looked at on a case by case basis, or you turn into a socialist.”

Now I suppose the validity could depend a bit on whether or not the US Taxpayer plowed money into a particular company to keep it afloat as "too big to fail." Here's the deal you f***ing Neanderthal, you tanked that company and wanted us to fix it for you and that's being done at the cost of the largest socialism experiment in goddam history. It isn't your money, it is the taxpayers' money and it isn't even your damn company anymore. This is the problem with half-assed approaches, some asswipe thinks it isn't socialism. The - Bailout - Is - Socialism. I don't give a damn that it follows the usual Republican model of privatize profits and socialize the risk, it has been done. I don't give a damn that as usual the winners are the plutocrats and not the workers, it is socialism.

There is a solution for what ails these people, but beating them and throwing them out their window is frowned upon in a so-called civilized society. Civilized assumes that exchanges aren't made at gun point - but they've brought out the gun. If you don't fix our mess your economy is just going to tank. They brought out the biggest WMD available outside the Defense Department, "everybody except the rich gets screwed into poverty."

Most of us who supported the concept of a bailout understood this piece and loathed them for putting that gun to our head. Of course you had to leave it to BushCo to make sure that what little control was in the authorization evaporated. Now I do not have income envy, but I do have a massive resentment for this "entitled" attitude. Their performance has entitled them to be unemployed from a broken and ruined company. Their paycheck, never mind bonus, is due to the American Taxpayer. I don't know how you get that concept through their thick skulled me-me-me heads short of violence.

I am scarcely a sole voice of discontent, the President of the US has voiced it along with various lawmakers including Claire McCaskill's pretty caustic reaction. You would think that might actually get through to them - pah.