Re: Gracias
> You don't get bonuses or promotions for failing to make something work.
Really????
AIG paid itself USD $218 Million in bonuses in March 2009, whie it was a Ward of the State - having been bailed out to the tune of USD $185 Billions - and being 85% owned by the US Department of the Treasury.
Citibank paid itself USD $5.3 Billion in bonuses in March 2009, according to the New York State Attorney General at the time - Andrew M. Cuomo:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/01/15/us-citigroup-pay-idUSTRE60E08J20100115
<QUOTE>
According to a July report from New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, Citigroup as a whole paid $5.3 billion of bonuses for 2008.
</QUOTE>
Citibank needed more than USD $1 Trillion in US government support just to stay afloat and not disintegrate after September 15, 2008.
Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs paid themselves USD $18 Billions in bonuses for 2008 - they year they both crashed and burned:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/business/31pay.html?_r=0
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aHURVoSUqpho
Merrill Lynch paid itself USD $3.6 Billions in bonuses for 2008, according to the same report by Andrew Cuomo:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/business/12merrill.html
Merrill Lynch was shotgun-married to Bank Of America on September 14, 2008, for the sole purpose of hiding systemic securities fraud and pervasive securities laws violations. Not that Merrill Lynch hadn't been fined before, in 2002, by New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, for securities fraud and securities laws violations.
Bank of America paid USD $3.3 Billions in bonuses for 2008, while receiving USD $90 Billions in US Government support in 2008 and 2009.
Should I continue? This farce posing as Capitalism isn't limited to banks. The Federal Reserve Board of Governors authorized 21,000 private lender loans to private entities and individuals - not banks - in 2008, totalling USD $3.3 Trillion:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-auerbach/the-federal-reserves-33-t_b_794155.html
Has anything changed since then? No. It's actually gotten worse than before September 15, 2008.
But, you go ahead and cheerlead to your heart's content, Don Jefe.