Obama, Biden 'outraged' by Wall Street bonuses

Every time I look at these blogs, they are loaded with Republicans hawking at Democrats. Where are they now? Their policies and greed over the eight years have put this country in bankruptcy. They are always the first to point finders look in the mirror jerks.............................

I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore !

President Obama and VP Biden are just blowing smoke - if they are outrraged then do something about it. I'm impatienrt with the Obama retoric - show me the beef. Out of respect for their offices I want say what I think there statements amount to

Read the EESA executive compensation guidlines on the Treasury website and it will give you a taste of their "outrage". According to the Treasury executives of companies that accept TARP money are "limted" to 3 times their compensation in a golden parachute. Thats a hell of a "limitation"

TARP and the ESSA and now the Stimulus package are a Federal Government Ponzi scheme.

Even more ouitragous is the impotent regulatory agencies. The Inspector General's office of the Treasury reported that one of their "sgnificant" investigationsa in their 2007 annual report was - the investigation of the misuse of a parkiing pass by an employee at the US Mint. He was reportedly fired for this.
As the markets were reeling ffrom fraudlent investment schemes i.e. Madoff - the Inspector General was investigating parking psses at the US Mint. You couldn't make this stuff up !

Wow...

so you should have done something about it when you had the chance. you say "if you want this bailout, you are going to limit your bonuses and compensation to these amounts." you guys dropped the ball by just handing out money with no accountability. more of our government in action

Let me get this straight - $18 Billion in bonuses for public and private companies on Wall Street is shameful but $820 B in new spending of OUR money is OK!?!?! WTF!?! $1.5 T in deficits and they're asking Wall Street to be responsible. Talk about the pot and the kettle!

If Goldman, BofA etc. wants to give their people a bunch of money even though they don't deserve it - who cares - it's their money. But don't spend MY money (taxes) on stupid things and think that's OK.

Instead of being outraged, President Obama should be demanding that we taxpayers get $18B of our money back. Action is what these financial guys think and do, so stop the words and take some action. Get our money back.

The assets of these companies should be seized immediately as well as the beneficiary's assets. This should fall under the Sarbanes/Oxley Law regarding financial mismanagement, where CEOs & CFOs can be criminally liable for the actions. Fuld's actions to protect his estate, clearly proves his criminal intent just prior to the failure of his institution. Shameful does not even begin to describe what these thieves have done to the American People. Get their Passports before they all head to some private offshore estate. Any company or institution that has or hopes to get TARP money needs to be held liable for these parachute payouts before any money is given or they must return those parachute payouts if they have already received TARP money

Most Wall Street brokers and executives believe that they are above the fray. Civic responsibility is not their concern. Most consider that the world wide business crash was not of their making. The fault lies with those stupid souls who believed that the housing market woud always rise and that they did not need substantial down payments, if any at all.Most false expectations and security fraud were hatched in the Board Rooms of Wall Street. Putin is not far off the mark in blaming the US for the crisis.

What I find funny about President Obama and his side kick Biden being so "outraged" about the bonuses is they can't see the over the pork that is embedded in this wonderful stimulus package. What is "shameful" is how he thinks it is OK to load up a stimulus package with so much crap to try and pay certain groups off. It is amazing that he doesn't see that some people see what he is doing. I was hoping for something different with a new leader but I can see it is the same ole, same ole government getting bigger. Sad....Sad....Sad

Disgusting. Being that I am one of the thousands of people who was laid off from the finance world in the past 6 months. I find the fact that these wall street executives gave out such exorbitant bonuses repulsive.

"I'm shocked, shocked that there's gambling going on here."
When Congress gave out Billions with NO STRINGS ATTACHED, what do you expect?

Government Bailout...I'M OUTRAGED!!!!!!!
Government Spending.....I'M OUTRAGED!!!!
Government Meddling.....I"M OUTRAGED!!!!
Government Corruption....I"M OUTRAGED!!!!!
Chris Dodd...I'M OUTRAGED
ACORN receiving a few Billion in this Bailout....I"M OUTRAGED!!!!

Get the idea....

Obama calls this "shameful", "outrageous", "the height of irresponsibility". Biden would like to "throw these guys in the brig". Why should anyone be surprised? It's big execs being paid for "non performance" and yet the bail-outs are still approved by Congress.

These are the same scoundrels that Obama is expecting to lead the way out of this mess. What's stopping him from doing something to remedy the situation - like a retroactive 100% tax on executive pay for any executive of a corp that needed a bailout or collapsed? "It's an outrage!!!" Talk is cheap. Don't tell me you are a leader - show me. Unfortunately we are now seeing Obama's lack of management/executive experience so soon in office. He only knows how to do the political thing like hand out the pork to pay back unions and ACORN for the votes they delivered. This is not coming together for change - it's business as usual..

Blaming "greed" is silly. Greed is like gravity. It exists. Don't blame the executives; blame the politicians (Bush, Obama, guilty!, guilty!) who voted for the bailout and made outrageous bonuses possible.

Am I the first one to post a comment because all of the other comments so far have contained expletives? This is outrageous. I hope that there are social ramifications to this. I would like to see people in the financial industry embarrassed to tell others what they do for a living.

As they say, "if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention." It looks like someone's paying attention now! Thanks for expressing our feelings, Mr. President.

Thank you Mr Obama and Biden for saying it like it is. It truly is ridiculous.

Maybe a list of these overpaid executives and their firms should be published, and the people can respond by boycotting these firms and those who support them.

It is on the surface an outrage those large bonuses were paid.
Hoever, I for one am outraged any in Congress even have the guts to take their pay after the way they have acted over the last few years. Both sides of the aisle are a bunch of nitwits. Barney Frank to John McCain.
posture, posture and more posturing.
Forget the damn pork and act as Americans. MONEY FOR THE ARTS IS A MUST BUT NOT IN A BAILOUT! BAILOUT FOR JOBS FOLKS!

Well, I'm outraged by their stimulus bill, so that makes us even. Well, maybe not $875B isn't quite as much as $18B!!

Why are they surprised about this?

It was the Senate (of which both Joe Biden AND Barack Obama were a part of) that moved to get this bailout bill through so hastily. They didn't worry about the finer details in the bill and they KNEW that there would be no oversight and no real control of the money once it was given to the banks.

Why didn't they try to stop this bill from going through or try to put stipulations on what the money could be used for and what certain compensations were allowed? I understand that they probably weren't too involved with this, but it was the rest of Congress that pushed this through. If you want to increase lending, why are you going to give money to banks that have cut lending drastically?

Here's a guy who nominates a tax cheat to guard the IRS and he's "outraged" at this news.

Please.

Why isn't the story that this was the biggest decrease in history. 33 million down to 18 million? Also how can you generalize and say that these are all the same people asking for aid?

Not much coverage either on all the excess spending by our government's 819 billion with YOUR tax money, not company profit.

Typical Globe, always attempting to rile the masses.

I cant find a job... And these asses are packing bonuses. Awesome. I can rest easy knowing that that thanks to my tax money, some Wall St. exec won't lose their plush Manhattan apartment.

I cant find a job... And these asses are packing bonuses. Awesome. I can rest easy knowing that that thanks to my tax money, some Wall St. exec won't lose their plush Manhattan apartment.

Well it looks like we know where $18 billion of the taxpayers money went!

Obama's buddy Geithner got a big bonus from the NY Fed - where's the outrage there? And why no outrage over the $1 trillion in pork Obama calls a "stimulus"?

This is the beginning. Soon the Obamunists will tell all of us what we can make.

I must be missing something here. Those are commissions. Are we to be told we cannot earn commissions for hard work. That sounds rather socialist to me.

What do we do, as consumers, as citizens of this country, to put a stop to this? I'm out of a job too. I even screwed my taxes to make sure I have enough money from my severance check to hold me over. I'm literally sick to my stomach.

Fire all the CEOs who are giving themselves huge bonues, buying corporate jets and spending millions to renovate their offices... replace them with the mid-level executives in their corporations who've been laid off in the past few months (at their previous salaries). It seems like we'd save enough cash that we wouldn't even need a bailout.

Lets not forget that President Obama has been in office for two weeks. Bush was at the helm for eight years. Now he is sitting in Texas with his feet up doing nothing to help the American people. More likely thinking about how to make things worse. Thank god we have a president that now cares more about the American people then his rich friends. And bt the way, was it not John McCain that ran off to Washington to suppor the bailout. There is only one reason we need a bailout at all.

Not that I think these bonuses are necessarily good, but for many employees of these firms, bonuses are an expected part of their compensation plan. For example, someone may have a salary of $100K but with an expected bonus of $50K. It's a bonus in the way it's paid, but it's an expected part of the salary.

Most people think of bonuses as turkey at Thanksgiving; that's because when they were hired, the bonus was not a promised part of their compensation plan. Although it may be a different magnitude, it’s like a waiter suddenly being told that he won’t be getting tips any more because the economy sucks.

BTW, for the dope who said “I'm impatient with the Obama rhetoric - show me the beef” – it’s a week and a half after the inauguration. It’s a little early to be calling the man a failure.

you republicans are idiots. these companies received OUR money and they aren't doing what they were supposed to do with it. wall st. just kissed the 2nd half of their bailout goodbye.

These executives and employees at Wall Street investment firms, especially those who work at the firms that asked for and received the bailout money, should not be getting bonuses at all, because of the way their clients' portfolio tanked when the stock market came tumbling down. They should not be rewarded for their poor performance!
There should have been more oversight on how the taxpayers' money was spent (and that would preclude dishing out bonuses), and I blame Congress, the previous administration and the Federal Reserve for not putting those mechanisms in place.

Now he is sitting in Texas with his feet up doing nothing to help the American people

Sounds like the last eight years. We'll maybe he did stand up a bit.

"That is the height of irresponsibility," the president said.

"It is shameful," Obama added.

Last time I checked, Obama WAS the president.

Read The Predator State by James Galbraith. These guys on Wall Street couldn't care less what Obama thinks. They are so out of control. Pity we didn't let Merrill go under instead of Lehman. Will that industry EVER get the regulation it needs so badly? Obama should insist on THAT...

I say let them all fail. Why give them more money. They should use this so called "bailout" money to help people that arelosing their homes/jobs. Why is it that only big coporations getting money. Can I ask for a bailout. Here is my official plea,

"Dear Congress,

Can I get 1 million dollars? This is chump change compared to what these other people are asking for. Instead of giving them 20 billion dollars, you can still give them 19.9 billion dollars. I don't think they will notice it that much. Actually maybe they will because they won't be able to pay off creditors (i mean bonuses) if they did not get the extra million dollars."

Learn from your mistakes, is what I learned in school and life. Hopefully the Gov't will finally learn that bailouts are not the answer.

The turmoil of the economic crisis was caused by probably 1/10th of 1% of the financial sector employees. So stop blaming the masses for the inactions of a few.

And if you want to point the finger in the right direction, remember what got these banks into trouble: garbage mortgage securities. These securities were troubled because people couldn't make their mortgage payments. And why did that happen? Because they took out mortgages they couldn't afford in the place. You can thank Bill Clinton and his affordable home ownership initiatives and Barney Frank's willingness to look the other way for half a decade from the true state of affairs at Fannie and Freddie. Didn't want to tell the marketplace the truth, did you Barney? Might have jeopardized your movement to fraudulently hand out mortgages (aka money) to people who had no ability to ever pay the money back. Keep puffing your hot air and the mindless will keep voting you in. Or at least the criminals.

I cannot fathom what is so outrageous about these bonuses. The entire financial system, from the Fed to Wall Street to the Government, is itself immoral. The pot calls the kettle black.

Didn't I see/hear last week that the Wall Street and financial executives
gave $47,000,000.00 to Obama for his election?

Didn't I see/hear last week that Wall Street and financial executives gave $17,000,000.00 for the inaugural parties?

They had to have the bonuses to pay the money asked of them by the lobbyists and financial people now on the staff of the President.

Obama is outraged? The same guy who puts together an $800 Billion dollar stimulous package filled with Pork and pet projects is outraged? The same guy who throws a $170 Million dollar inauguration party while the economy is in the toilet is outraged? The same guy who just signed an executive order to allow our Federal Tax dollars to be used to fund abortions for girls in foreign countries is outraged? Look in the mirror Obama. Talk about financial irresponsiblity!

Obamas secretary of treasury is just as Greedy as the ones who took bonusus in hard times. I bet he is one of many we will find in this cabinet who has some corrupt ways about themselves.

Publish a precise list of these executives, the amount of each bonus, the company they represent and the addresses.
Let's bombard them with our reactions.

So they pulled a fast one again. So, do what the government would do to John Q Public. Get the money back from them. Exec's hand it back over or your bank account will be attached and take it. And those of you who miss used the money will not get another cent and if you don't, off to jail you go! Give it to those who are truly interested in getting this country back on their feet.The people of this country did not fight and die protecting our freedom to make a few rich at the expense of the nation. STOP IT!

Don't just be 'outraged', do something about it!
Write your senator here: www.returnthebonus.com
Template and email addressed provided.
Outraged!