Americanly Yours

There has been a lot of public outrage against AIG for paying some of its executives retention bonuses.  The logic here is that AIG is a struggling company that has accepted well over $150,000,000,000 [$150 billion] in federal government aid, and therefore should not be giving its employees bonuses.  Before we all grab out pitchforks and torches, we must remember that it is not legal for the federal government to create a new tax targeted towards AIG’s executives.

Retroactively taxing AIG employees’ bonuses is an unconstitutional act.  Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of The Constitution reads as follows:  “No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.”

The prohibition on passing bills of attainder means that it is illegal for Congress to pass a law that punishes AIG employees (or any other specific group of people) without granting due process.  The prohibition on passing ex post facto laws means that Congress cant pass a law declaring something to be illegal and then punish people for committing the act before it was illegal.

Congress is currently debating passing a bill that would tax AIG executives’ bonuses at 90%.  The House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bill that would do preciously this last week.  This bill is unconstitutional and should not be passed by the Senate.  If it does pass the Senate, then President Obama should stand up for the Constitution and veto it.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet

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The American people and Congress may have rejected a bailout for the automakers, but in his infinite wisdom (and apparently infinite power, as I was unaware that a President could circumvent our Constitution and our laws to enact legislation without the consent of Congress), our President has thrown Chrysler and GM a lifeline by giving them $17.4 billion.   Remember, Chrysler is the same company whose owners would not contribute their own billions to save, so clearly this is another smart investment from the Federal Government.  Luckily, Ford has announced that it doesn’t need the money and will not be requesting any.  With this new bailout, the government now has the right to purchase stock in the two companies and place them under governmental supervision.

President Bush, thanks for Socialism!

The government that is supposed to represent you has taken your money through taxes on your hard work and is using this money–without your permission or even your approval–to purchase stock in two failing auto companies.

Do you still think Robin Hood was a great man?

This act completely violates the basic core principles of both Democracy and Capitalism.  The principles of Democracy are violated because the government is acting without the consent of the people, and is in fact acting opposite of the desires of the people.  The principles of Capitalism are violated because the government is taking ownership in two more American companies, placing factors of production directly under its control.

Does anyone really think that $17.4 billion can save the automakers?  This money is just an excuse for the government to put more money into the companies in the future to protect their initial investment.  In poker, you are called “pot committed” when you have a large enough amount of money in the pot to justify calling a bet that you know you will lose.  In the investing world, this is called throwing good money after bad money.  I thik the investors have it right this time.

Americanly Yours,

Phred Barnet