mls245q on April 29, 2009 at 2:07 PM

Thank you very much for your post.

There are many good companies and the management of Fed-Ex shared the pain by cutting their own pay. That’s called leadership and I was impressed.

Unfortunately, there is a managerial elite, the interchangeable rootless ones, who believe they are exempt from the messes they make. Now, the sewage overflows onto Main Street, and the perps squeal like pigs at having to take responsibility. They act no different than our political class.

The key for conservatives is a recognition that corporate giantism, with its enormous power, is the flip-side of government giantism. Corporatism can benefit from free-market capitalism (as can we all) but the key is in recognizing the difference between the two. Amoral corporatists will squash the free market and abandon the nation that made their success possible, when they can get away with it.

These aren’t new ideas and there is some tentative recognition of the problem in conservative publications.

Axiom No. 5: Don’t trust big business.

Like I said before the election- by the end of his four years in office the USA will have been transformed beyond all recognition.

And none of it in a good way.

Right now, Senator Spector of Pennsylvania is getting kicked on another thread on this site for simply exercising the behavior of self-preservation. We see this as dishonourable, and I agree that it is. But what makes energy traders in citigroup more honourable for essentially blackmailing citigroup management for bonuses that it shouldn’t be paying? When Senator Spector behaves selfishly, we call it evil. When employees of a failing company behave selfishly, we call it “looking for greener pastures…” This confuses me.

It seems like we shift the definition of performance in order to suit the immediate need of the person using the term. AIG did this also. If the whole business is losing money, then phrases like “belt-tightening”, “cost-cutting”, “We’re all in this together” get thrown around, and raises and bonuses aren’t paid. This is all done in the name of saving the entity as a whole. Yet, when justifying the bonuses at AIG before congress, Ed Liddy suddenly decided that performance meant arranging the deck chairs neatly on the Titanic, and not avoiding the iceberg altogether. “Our people at the Financial Products Unit in Connecticut have done a remarkable job of unwinding our business there, and should therefore receive their contractually obligated bonuses”.

You see, I am a conservative who works for a technology company. I’ve been a conservative for about 20 years. I’ve been told if I work smart, hard, and ethically, then the benefits I’ll accrue will outweight the difficulties I encounter. This I’ve believed. Then my company, under the guise of fiscal discipline in a time of economic crisis has decided to layoff about 25000 employees and cut our pay by about 10% across the board. Now, I’ve been lucky…I still have my job for now, and the fact that the suffering has been applied across the board ameliorates the situation somewhat.

Now, I see the standard bearers for free-market capitalism, the big investment bankers, the risk takers, NOT want to step up and admit their culpability in wrecking the reputation of capitalism. These guys have the gall to demand bonuses amidst the carnage. They’ll turn a generation of young people against them, and socialism will become fashionable and attractive once again, simply because these guys aren’t honorable enough to admit they screwed up. They’ll behave just as selfishly as Arlen Specter and we’ll clap… Makes me sick.

I think conservatives are going to have a difficult time convincing America to trust them with the “car keys” anytime soon. While there is certainly blame to go around, deregulation, and simple greed are preponderantly responsible for this debacle.

Saying “Yes” would likey ignite another bonus riot. But saying “No” would likely lead to tallent losses and reduced profits. And splitting the difference would likely lead to both.

Enjoy your crap sandwich Mr. Obama.

They don’t want these two banks to go out of business, because then they couldn’t control how and to whom they lend in the future.
JiangxiDad on April 29, 2009 at 11:33 AM

And they are very large institutions, which makes control all that much easier.
Speaking of capitalism, maybe the natural thing is for these obscene conglomerates to break up. The AIG CEO testified before Congress that the company had too many units and was opaque, not transparent.

I ditched BofA several years ago for a small community bank and was glad they didn’t get bought out last year. To me, buyouts mean higher fees and impersonal service. All for the shareholders, of course.

Giving to leftist causes like ACORN is another reason to ditch those creepy institutions.

People at that unit, Phibro, are threatening to leave because of pay caps tied to the U.S. bailout of Citigroup

If Citi wants to re-open the bonus wound, then more power to ‘em. They made their own bed with the government and liberals aren’t the only ones offended.

There’s an old saying that I just made up “Once you let the camel in the tent, you’re gonna have to sleep with it”. If Citi doesn’t want to have to ask, then Citi should return the US Taxpayer dollars plus interest. Then Citi can do what it pleases.

GarandFan on April 29, 2009 at 11:10 AM

Nobody is crying for Citi, or BofA for that matter. Lewis could have been a man and told Paulson/Bernanke and their masters to f**k themselves. So maybe he would have lost his job or been threatened. JTP endured it.

The problem is that if we let the Obamites get their hands on the financial system, it’s just another nail in our coffin. They don’t want these two banks to go out of business, because then they couldn’t control how and to whom they lend in the future. Just like Kim in N. Korea needs a bank to do his dirty deals (the one in Macau where he launders his money), the Obama thugs could use a bank, or two, or three.

$4,374,098 in 2008 cycle; 61% to Democrats (was only 53-44 in 2006 and almost 50-50 in 2004)

Total contributions to Barack Obama: $611,032

Citigroup made a very good strategic investment in this Administration.

Total contributions: $3,475,017

65% to Democrats

Why Citigroup gets whatever the hell it wants, including your tax dollars

(If you’re going to offer up a massive bank bail-out, then Bank of America should deserve salvation before Citi, since their problem was in large part caused by government, when they were forced to take on the debts of Merrill Lynch last fall. Citi, on the other hand, managed to drown themselves in red ink on their own terms.)

milwife88 on April 29, 2009 at 10:42 AM

Thanks milwife88… since that is indeed the case, I’m sure that some of the companies who were forced to take bailout money are going to have a lot of undeserved scrutiny and anger directed at them… just read some of the comments on this thread. These are the companies who did things correctly and prepared for times such as this, but now have to be careful about how they continue to run their business because of being watched so closely. I fear that some of the executives and “the brains” behind these will begin to leave in droves due to the scrutiny. The possibility of these very successful companies beginning to fail is much higher now.

First US Mexican Flu death from Mexican child crossing border to Texas.

They were too big to fail. Now they will be too big to be free. You are right that the talent will move to hedge funds, especially a trading operation like Phibro. There is no real need for them to be tied to a commercial bank that is on its way to becoming a regulated utility.

dedalus on April 29, 2009 at 10:42 AM

It’s early, but that’s a Comment of the Day™ nominee.

Citi and GM will very likely collapse under governmental stupidity and hopefully will serve as a lesson to other companies with fiscally negligent management.

You heard right. Companies like Wells Fargo, BB&T, Regions bank and others were forced to take the money eventhough they didn’t want or need it. As I posted yesterday they are all paying 5% interest on the TARP money to the govt. That is why most of the ones forced to take the money want to pay it back but the govt will not let them. The govt is so strapped for cash that they need that interest to accrue. FUBAR, total FUBAR!!!