AIG puts bailout money to good use

Gee, why doesn't anyone have any faith in these guys learning a lesson and cleaning up their act

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5973452&page=1

Less than a week after the federal government committed $85 billion to bail out AIG, executives of the giant AIG insurance company headed for a week-long retreat at a luxury resort and spa, the St. Regis Resort in Monarch Beach, California, Congressional investigators revealed today.

Two AIG CEOs testify to Congress about their use of taxpayer bailout money."Rooms at this resort can cost over $1,000 a night," Congressman Henry Waxman (D-CA) said this morning as his committee continued its investigation of Wall Street and its CEOs.

AIG documents obtained by Waxman's investigators show the company paid more than $440,000 for the retreat, including nearly $200,000 for rooms, $150,000 for meals and $23,000 in spa charges.

"They're getting their pedicures and their manicures and the American people are paying for that," said Cong. Elijah Cummings (D-MD).

"This unbridled greed," said Cong. Mark Souder (R-IN), "it's an insensitivity to how people are spending our dollars."

Appearing before the committee, Martin Sullivan, the AIG CEO until June, said the company was overwhelmed by a "financial global tsunami," and that "no simple or single cause" was to blame.

To quote the mouthbreathers at the recent Sarah Palin concerts:

"Kill them!"

Public hangings for execs seems to be the only viable solution.

Seriously. Those shiny happy persons need to go to jail.

Hey, those guys were stressed out wondering if they would even have a job in the future.

They needed to relax and plan for the next phase.

Wally wrote: "This unbridled greed," said Cong. Mark Souder (R-IN), "it's an insensitivity to how people are spending our dollars."

A Republican congressman said that. That's how bad this is.

2 words. Public executions.

OK, first off the "bail out" wasn't cause AIG didn't have any money. They had lots of money and LOTS of less liquid assets, but they had an extremely large call that they couldn't meet without using cash money they had. Said cash money would have lowered their reserve levels to below what the govt said they must keep in order to be an Insurance co. and the govt would have been force to close them. They had two choices, meet the call and fold the insurance company, or try to dump huge amounts of assets on the market and sell at fire sale prices which would have worsened the economy.

No one has ever said they were poor.

Secondly no one bailed them out, they made them a loan which AIG has to pay back. There is some justice in this world because AIG got a "B" loan and buying "B" loans is what got them into this mess.

And thirdly even I could use a trip to the spa to recover from all the media circus of the election and the economy.

And this just in, Carguys AIG stock option falls after he visits Cali health spa.

You missed the better part of the story here. The FORMER CEO was asked, in light of the collapse of AIG, would he consider giving back his $20 MILLION dollar bonus...for the SH**TY job he did running AIG? In front of a Congressional committee, and in front of the media, his answer: NOPE.

GameboyRMH wrote:

Wally wrote: "This unbridled greed," said Cong. Mark Souder (R-IN), "it's an insensitivity to how people are spending our dollars."

A Republican congressman said that. That's how bad this is.

Hahahaha exactly.

Would you?

And who said he did a shty job running AIG? They had an unexpected HUGE call on a loan that was caused by, drumroll please, the OTHER companies problems. AIG's management didn't figure in the call at all and it was nothing they could have anticipated.

carguy123 wrote: Would you? And who said he did a shty job running AIG? They had an unexpected HUGE call on a loan that was caused by, drumroll please, the OTHER companies problems. AIG's management didn't figure in the call at all and it was nothing they could have anticipated.

If you're a CEO getting paid millions and millions of dollars, aren't you expected to anticipate bad stuff happening just as much as knowing when/how to do good stuff too? If they can't see anything any better than the next guy, they shouldn't be getting paid like that. If they can, they deserve every penny. Obviously, that guy didn't deserve it. With that said, there's no way in hell I'd give the money back if some company thought I was the second coming of Christ and paid me millions of dollars to do a horrible job.

Bryce

I would. The way I see it, if I was in his shoes I haven't earned that money and to take it would be stealing from my employer. And now, the American taxpayer.

Being able to look at myself in the mirror is more important than money, even if it is a crapload of money.

And besides, by giving it back I'd come out smelling like roses.

Wait a minute...

Isn't their a big difference between AIG insurance (solvent- no money issues), and AIG financial (who got the $85 large)?

You guys are not making any distinction.

Well, Tim, that's why we're not CEOs. The people who select them are all crooks, and they only select other crooks to be CEOs, with a wink-wink, we'll pick you, you pick us at the next one.

Tim Baxter wrote: I would. The way I see it, if I was in his shoes I haven't earned that money and to take it would be stealing from my employer. And now, the American taxpayer. Being able to look at myself in the mirror is more important than money, even if it is a crapload of money. And besides, by giving it back I'd come out smelling like roses.

So, if you left GRM today (by your own choice, or their choice, hypothetically) and in 6 months they said your website sucks donkey nards and has cost the magazine huge losses (they had to get a loan for a new programmer, etc. etc.) but they'd feel ok about it if you gave them back $150k, would you give it back? You were doing your best and they picked you to do the job, who should be held responsible for GRM picking a crummy employee, you or GRM? Sure, we're talking different sums of money, but it's all relative. I'm sure Mr. AIG CEO thought he was doing a great job and the company obviously thought he was worth it or they wouldn't have given him the bonus. Who should suffer, the individual or the company? Companies that make stupid decisions like that should suffer the consequences and stop paying people like that, IMO. If I pay $1000 for a bottle of wine, but afterwards I'm horribly disappointed with the bottle of wine and it didn't make her panties fall off like I expected it would, I don't have the option of getting my $1000 back just because it was a poor decision and the wine steward shouldn't feel guilty for taking my $1000 when the bottle of wine was probably really only worth $125. Now, imagine going to your local bank for a loan because you can't make your rent payment after buying a $1000 bottle of wine that did absolutely nothing positive for you....

Bryce

OK, Bryce. Let's say that the wine steward tells you that this $1K bottle of wine will definetly make her panties fall off, and even though the last six people who bought it were not really happy with it, that doesn't matter. If you just give him $1K for that bottle, wonderful things will happen. Now, you also sell wine to other people for $1K/bottle with the same promise, including to "friends" of this wine steward, or friends of friends. So, you pay $1K for this bottle of wine and the wine was really only marginally better than MD 20-20. Should you demand your money back? If you do, then the people you sell wine to will demand their's back also.

Let's get back to the panties falling off part. Once I heard that I didn't pay a bit of attention to what else anyone was saying.

You know what they say, the easiest way for panties to fall is to cut them at the ends (wait... do they say that?)

To further perfect your analogy, Bryce, that thousand bucks should be someone else's money. They you don't feel so bad about blowing it.

Here's a good Who's-Who of the mess we find ourselves in: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=76191

MitchellC wrote: You know what they say, the easiest way for panties to fall is to cut them at the ends (wait... do they say that?)

Sure they do. It's written on my business card! (<---- Lies! All lies!)

on one side I'm angry at these guys..

on another.. I'm wondering how I get a piece of their pie..

Heard today that they are now getting ANOTHER $35B loan on top of the $85B loan already commited

Going back to the original post, this looks remarkably like the sales conferences that most companies of AIG's size seem to have. My wife organized a couple before she moved out of sales support and became a sales person in her own right.