Note: Mike Kingsbury is an RN and a Grassroots Lobbyist through SEIU's Change That Works campaign. You can read more about the program here.
Mike Kingsbury snapped this photo of AIG CEO Edward Liddy testifying before Congress.
In the packed hearing, I listened as Congressman Barney Frank asked for - and Mr. Liddy declined to provide - names of the AIG executives who received bonuses. When pressed under threat of subpoena, he resisted, suggesting their lives would be threatened by the general public "if only we could get our hands on them."
Mr. Liddy, we are not an angry mob. We want justice, not blood. And, yes, we want the names of those whose million-dollar bonuses we all paid. We don't want to "string them up," we want to ask them what they know about shared sacrifice. The woman waiting in line with me at the hearing told about how, when things got rough, she lived on crackers and cheese and peanut butter. For most Americans, shared sacrifice doesn't mean giving up our European vacation - most of us have never been to Europe.
So, yes, give it back - every last dollar of the bonuses, every last dime of the bailout. But if, at the end of the day, all the money is paid back, all the criminals are prosecuted, AIG is on its feet again, but we still have the same system that caused this to happen - we still bailout banks but let workers lose their homes and their health care - I will still be mad.
I don't expect a million dollar bonus. I want a choice about whether to have a union. I want affordable health care. I just want to live in a country that works for working people.
While I'm glad I saw the beginnings of that in the hearing yesterday, I also saw the possibility that business might try to give us a "sacrificial offering," and hope we are appeased.
I know I won't be.
From our nation's capital,
Mike Kingsbury, RN
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WHO KILLED AIG?
(Who Killed Davey Moore, Bob Dylan)
WilliamBanzai7 Blog
Sing along: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62daicHQ9as
Who killed A-I-G,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," say Greenburg, Sullivan and Willumstead
"Don't point your finger at we three CEO braindead.
We could've stopped it in the early days
An' maybe kept it from this fate,
But the markets would've booed, we're sure,
At not gettin' its money's worth.
It's too bad we three had to to go,
But there was a pressure on we too, you know.
It wasn't we three that made AIG fall.
No, you can't blame we three for incompetence, lyin or financial thievery at all."
Who killed AIG,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," cry AIG's derivative traders,
Whose screams filled the trading floors loud.
"It's too bad AIG died alright
But we just like to write dumbass hedges all night.
We didn't mean AIG t' meet its death,
We just meant to plunder it with bonuses n obscene bets,
There ain't nothing wrong in that.
It wasn't us that made AIG fall.
No, you can't blame us at all."
Who killed AIG,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," say the politicians and regulators,
Puffing on big Goldman private label cigars.
"It's hard to say, it's hard to smell,
We always thought that AIG was well.
It's too bad for the taxpayers and shareholders AIG's walking dead,
But if it was sick, someone else should've said.
It wasn't we that made AIG fall.
No, you can't blame we at all."
Who killed AIG,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," say the gambling institutional AIG fans,
With their unmailed proxy ballots still in their hands.
"It wasn't we that knocked AIG down,
Wh never dreamt AIG's Board was dumber than dumb.
We didn't commit no ugly sin,
Anyway, we put money on AIG to win.
It wasn't we that made AIG fall.
No, you can't blame we at all."
Who killed AIG,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," says the rating agencies,
Spewing useless drivel using their useless models,
Sayin', "the Ratings ain't to blame,
There's just as much danger in
the subprime dating game."
Sayin', "Financial innovation is here to stay,
It's just the old American way.
It wasn't we that made AIG fall.
No, you can't blame we at all."
Who killed AIG,
Why an' what's the reason for?
"Not we," says Goldman Sachs whose subprime trades
Laid AIG low in a cloud of counterparty risk haze,
Whose CEO led them through AIG's mega billion bailout back door
Even though they say they were hedged from the ground to the top floor.
"We hit em, we hit em, yes, it's true,
But that's what we Wall Street bankers n traders are paid to do.
Don't say 'murder,' don't say 'kill.'
It was destiny, it was the market God's will."