Fomenting Civil War

From Associated Press via Yahoo News:

AP study finds $1.6B went to bailed-out bank execs
Banks that have their hands out in Washington this year were handing out multimillion-dollar rewards to their executives last year.

The 116 banks that so far have received taxpayer dollars to boost them through the economic crisis gave their top tier of executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses and other benefits in 2007, an Associated Press analysis found.

That amount, spread among the 600 highest paid bank executives, would cover the bailout money given to several banks that have shared in the $188 billion that Washington has doled out in rescue packages so far.

The AP compiled total compensation based on annual reports that the banks file with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The 116 banks have so far received $188 billion in taxpayer help. Among the findings:

-The average paid to each of the banks' top executives was $2.6 million in salary, bonuses and benefits.

-Lloyd Blankfein, president and chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs, took home nearly $54 million in compensation last year. The company's top five executives received a total of $242 million.

But furthermore, what of the absolute arrogance of the recipients, the refusal to be accountable? Read this:

But after receiving billions in aid from U.S. taxpayers, the nation's largest banks say they can't track exactly how they're spending the money or they simply refuse to discuss it.

"We've lent some of it. We've not lent some of it. We've not given any accounting of, 'Here's how we're doing it,'" said Thomas Kelly, a spokesman for JPMorgan Chase, which received $25 billion in emergency bailout money. "We have not disclosed that to the public. We're declining to."

The Associated Press contacted 21 banks that received at least $1 billion in government money and asked four questions: How much has been spent? What was it spent on? How much is being held in savings, and what's the plan for the rest?

None of the banks provided specific answers.

"We're not providing dollar-in, dollar-out tracking," said Barry Koling, a spokesman for Atlanta, Ga.-based SunTrust Banks Inc., which got $3.5 billion in taxpayer dollars.

Some banks said they simply didn't know where the money was going.

This, ladies and gentlemen, isn't Washington's money. It isn't local money or any kind of government money at all.

This is your money.

There is only one source of money: yours. You possess the blood-vein from which all of government taps.

Billions of dollars to banks, investment firms, accounting firms and now corporations. Billions and billions of dollars proffered to those who are only assured to continue on the same path to fiscal destruction. Billions and billions of dollars pissed away with absolutely no accountability whatsoever. And there only exists a future of these same entities coming back again and again and again to feed at the governmental trough. A trough filled by you and me. A trough we are mandated to fill and refill by governmental fiat.

Further, the government wants to see my books once a year?

I want to see their books. Open. For everyone. All the time.

And I want to see consequences -- just as there would be consequences for my irresponsible spending. I cannot spend money I do not have. I would eventually be arrested, and suffer consequences.

Government spends anything it wishes with little if any oversight.

Listen to me, my United States government: if you actually wish to foment insurrection, mass insurrection, violent insurrection, even a civil war, then you simply keep on this path.

How long are We The People, the source of this cash -- which is the result of the blood, sweat and tears of our labors -- going to acquiesce and continue to allow this behavior to run unchecked?

This is simply too egregious to ignore. And I am of sufficient anger that I must end this post now.

BZ