AIG Bonus Demagoguery Is a Distraction. Turn the Page.

Mary Kate... you open with "I've been avoiding writing about the AIG bonuses..." yet here you are, writing about it. And where did you get your $165 million figure from? Another of you TJ Street bloggers quotes you with that figure and in the same story quotes Washington Post story that the figure is over $400 million. Did you "fact check" the number? Did your TJ Street commrade "fact check" it? He definitely didn't note any reason for the discrepancies for what he was "reporting"? Did the Post report/editor/publisher "fact check" their number?

Personally I feel there is too much blogging and too little reporting. We the people know too little about the federal budget and money process because the news media doesn't "report" on it, they "blog" about it with a few "facts" they don't explain. Then the people, and our government representatives, with too few facts and even less knowledge about the subject get outraged and propose knee jerk reactions because they don't have the facts.

Example... lots of stories and blogs talking about the FED buying trillions of dollars of bonds to pump money into the economy (even stated by you above). WHAT??? Is this one US government agency spending money to buy bonds from another US government agency? Where did the FED get this trillion dollars? Did they print the money? Wait, I think the Treasury prints the money, so if the FED did then that would be counterfeit. Did they borrow it? Was it just lying around? SOMEBODY needs to REPORT about this process and let us know what's really going on? This could be just as diabolical as the selling and reselling and reselling and reselling of risky mortgages and the derivatives and insurance polices for these mortgages and derivatives that put us in this mess to begin with.

Your "story" quotes this media source and that media source. Do you go out and get any of this information on your own? How much does USN&WR pay you to sit and read other stuff then quote a line or two and add your twist on it? And how do I get a cushy gig like that?

Phil of NJ 11:54AM March 21, 2009

I would like a list of all of the people that have taken campaign contributions from AIG and the other "bailout" crowd.

Once we have the list the outrage should be directed at them to return every penny. And I mean from the White House all the way down. These are the people that sold out America.

Larry of CA 2:21PM March 19, 2009