It's amazing to me how quickly, when people are told to "get angry!", they ask "how high?".
Normally thoughtful people seem to believe that the recipients of retention bonuses at AIG should be punished. After all, they caused this mess! Grr!
But ignorance is bliss, or in this case, fury. The people who caused this mess left AIG a year ago. The people who are there are the ones brought in to clean it up.
You show up at a house. It's mostly smoldering cinders. There are firemen hosing it down. Do you demonize the firemen? Are you pissed that they are compensated for dangerous work?
Do you blame emergency room workers for all the injured people around them? If we cut their pay, do we expect the ER to operate better?
The whole episode of the House voting specifically to punish AIG, based purely on public outrage, is governance by angry mob -- led by Democrats, and supported by too many Republicans.
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