by B Smith

Created on: March 26, 2009   Last Updated: April 01, 2009

Should AIG executives be forced to return bonuses paid with federal bailout money?

Imagine that you receive a $5 million signing bonus as a new quarterback for the Detroit Lions for the 2009-2010 season. You suit up and play throughout the preseason and you begin the regular season. Now the 2008-2009 was a disastrous one for the Lions. They were 0-16. That is quite pathetic! So the day for the first game finally arrives and you hit the field full of enthusiasm and, promptly lose the first game of the season. And so it goes; the Lions are en-route to another 0-16 season. Should you return the signing bonus? No!

Imagine if you work for a company and they contract with you to wash your car once a week for the entire summer. What happens? The first week of the summer you end up in an accident and your car is in the shop for the next two months. Do you have to pay the person that was supposed to wash your car but now cannot because it is in the shop? Yes you do as you have a contract.

These AIG executives had contracts with AIG to be paid bonuses in the event certain criteria were met. Apparently the criteria were met and AIG, under contract law, was required to pay them. It is really that simple. So what is the problem?

We have witnessed all of this outrage at the company honoring its contracts. We have witnessed mob mentality by watching people march to the private homes of these executives and making derogatory comments about private citizens. We have read of the threats of murder to these executives! They have even threatened their families. Imagine someone coming into your home and killing your family because your company paid you according to a contract that it agreed to do. Then there are the politicians demanding the names of the recipients. Senator Barney Frank demanded that Edward Liddy, CEO of AIG give his committee their names. He actually wanted the names of these executives read into public record even though he knew they had received murderous threats from some demented individuals. This is unreal! Why the outrage over the honoring of contracts? Because it was government bailout money?

Please allow me the opportunity to dig deeper. If you see things as I see them, then you see the outrage coming from the democrat side of the aisle. These are the same people that approved of the money going to AIG in the first place. The same people represented by none other than President Obama himself that promised to, "go-line-by line" over spending bills during the

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