The Problem With Flogging A.I.G.
21st March 2009
(In light of the death threats, when Mr. Cuomo received the list of A.I.G. bonus recipients on Thursday, he promised to consider “individual security” and “privacy rights” in deciding whether to publicize the names.)
Would you trust your safety to the discretion of Andrew Cuomo, a politician on the model of Elliot Spitzer and Chuckie Schumer? I wouldn’t. The only thing you can trust him to do is to sell out for the highest price.
How can you run a company when the rules keep changing, when you have to worry about being second-guessed by Congress? Who can do business under those circumstances?
Answer: You can’t. And you can’t get intelligent people to sign up for such a crap shoot.
This program could help revive the consumer credit market. But at this point, most Wall Street bankers would rather be attacked by wild dogs than take part. They fear that they’ll do something — make money perhaps? — that will arouse Congressional ire. Or that the rules will change.
So the only people who are willing to run a large company these days are the sort who are former boyfriends of powerful Congressmen, or equivalent, who are sufficiently connected to remain protected.
What the country really needs right now from Congress is facts instead of rhetoric. Instead of these “raise your hand if you took a private jet to get here” exercises of outraged populism, we need hearings that educate and illuminate.
Good luck getting that from this Congress.