CNBC's Rick Santelli must be a glutton for punishment. After becoming a "viral sensation" (at least that's how the anchors on partnering MSNBC put it) for going to the Chicago markets and calling for a modern day Tea Party (that was really organized by sleeper cells and/or Ed Koch), he's back at it again. This time though, he's trying to be a tad more subtle about why it's the government's, not AIG's, fault that taxpayer money is funneling into executive bonuses for the company. Video after the jump.
His argument about towels is really lost on me. So is the analogy to government and big business being like oil and vinegar. I'm pretty sure that is not the phrase people use in these scenarios, unless they are ordering a salad.
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Boy is he right!
This whole AIG bonus thing is just the government's ploy to divert the public's attention from the horrible mess they have made with AIG.
Amount taxpayer dollars going to AIG bonus contracts sighed in March of 2008: $165,000,000. (ie, 165 million)
Amount taxpayer dollars going to AIG passing on to FOREIGN COUNTRIES: $61,000,000,000. (ie, 61 billion)!
The folks that are yelling "shame shame shame" are the ones who should be feeling shame shame shame. (congress and the treasury)
Right on, Grendel! Santelli has been right, from his first rant. He was NOT railing against people innocently caught up in the mortgage mess. If you go back and really LISTEN to what he said a few weeks ago, he was railing against the government's bailout plan not providing a mechanism to tell the difference between the them and the real deadbeats. Instead, let's just throw taxpayers' money at EVERYONE, and not care who ginned the system. What else was lost that morning was host Mark Haines' statement prior to Santelli's when the plan was announced: "We have just taught an entire generation of young homebuyers how to purchase more home than they can afford". Congress should be ashamed.
@fanofgrendel:
hey! I've been looking for you here. we got some things to discuss some more.
email me on gawker no?
@MarkH:
you friends of fangrendel too?
i'm fat and nobody loves me.
It's Tim Geithner's and Barrack Obama's mess now. Geithner was the architect of the TARP bailout for AIG and Obama absolved the Bushies from any responsibility after he signed his name on the dotted line of the midnight-stimulus bill. The midnight-stimulus bill has language that protects recipients to unmitigatingly distribute bonuses under TARP.
You made your beds now gentlemen, but I doubt you will be able to sleep in it for long.
DTOM - an unrepentant ex-liberal
I think you all are forgetting something important here. The AIG bailout occurred under the BUSH administration. Those bonuses were agreed to under the BUSH administration. Obama's administration is trying to set things right. More cleanup from Bush mistakes and just rampant disregard for the American taxpayer. When is Santisilly going to call BUSH a loser?
@Just Sayiing: You are a broken record stuck on BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH BUSH…
@Just Sayiing: Leading the charge for the Bush Treasury under TRAP was unrepentent tax evader Geithner. The facts not fantasy.
Hundred years from now they will still try to pen their abject failures onto Bush. The mind of a 99.6er.
Dammit to hell it WAS BUSH!
@bam-a-lam: he's gone. Your guy's in charge. Unfortunately he's proving he can't find his ass with a road map.
I cannot believe all of this denial. BUSH was the PRESIDENT dipshits! That means he WAS IN CHARGE! Got it? It's called the chain of command! Do you idiots need a picture book so you can understand? Jeesh!
@fanofgrendel:
hey, why you ignoring me, we got to discuss some things some more you and me
@grendel: The first huge installment of bailout money had no restrictions at all, and that was under Bush. You know that. The new administration is having to deal with that as well as placing some accountability on current bailouts. The whole thing is a runaway train, but it's certainly not the fault of this new administration. How they deal with it is going to be their own, but how they got to this point is not.
Bam-A-Lame you're at it again. WHO CONTROLLED CONGRESS WHEN THE VOTE WAS MADE FOR THE BAILOUT???? HARRY REID AND NANCY PELOSI (DEMS). The Dems controlled the Congress and jammed through the bill because they had the votes. WHO VOTED AGAINST REGULATING FANNIE MAE/FREDDIE MAC? REP. FRANK AND SEN. DODD (DEMS). WHO SLIPPED THE LANGUAGE INTO THE BAILOUT BILL PROTECTING THE AIG BONUS PAYOUTS??? SEN DODD (DEM).
Can't you just acknowledge the facts and not just be a lying liberal?
@America: Lying liberal? That's stretching it. ALL CAPS AREN'T REALLY NECESSSARY. I'll have to go back and "check the facts" for sure, but I distinctly recall the Bush adm. pushing the bailout like they pushed the war in Iraq.
@bam-a-lam:
Can't stand the facts can you. The Dems that control Congress are spending all of our money before our children can even make it and liberals are all for it! Why is that?
@ILoveAmerica: The Senator Dodd business is quite interesting. His provision backhanded through that allowed the bonuses sure looks like a payback. The only BUSH to blame for that is the one Dodd is hiding behind.
Here's a Dodd photo taken with an AIG guy's cellphone:
@America: Damn. I said I'd check the facts, so I'm not afraid of them. If what you say is true, I have no problem placing blame where it belongs. I'm not a liberal no matter what, I'm just liberal in my beliefs.
Didn't you guys get the memo? When Bush was in charge, everything that went wrong was Bill Clintons' fault.
But now Bush is gone, everything is Obama's fault. Republicans never, ever do anything wrong and Democrats never, ever do anything right.
That's how accountability works.
sheesh!
@ILoveAmerica: YOUR children deserve nothing.
@Darth Paul:
If I had your intellect I'd have your life…
NEW YORK, March 18 (Reuters) - NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker fired back at comedian Jon Stewart on Wednesday, saying it was "unfair" and "absurd" for the funnyman to criticize CNBC and question its coverage of financial news.
"Everybody wants to find a scapegoat. That's human nature," Zucker said during a keynote address at a media industry conference. "But to suggest that the business media or CNBC was responsible for what is going on now is absurd."
@fanofgrendel:
Absolutely!
The only people responsible for anything bad are democrats. Ever!
Poor Zucker.
@fanofgrendel: Hey..Hey……like your observations…….absurd….defines J. Zucker in the Funk and Wagnalls.
I think most Americans are going to give Obama a pass for at least a year or mid-summer. These Wall Street companies were pulling this crap for the past 8 years and Bush started giving out the Bailouts. Americans Should be upset and angry at Wall STreet. They're not upset with Obama because he didn't cause this crisis, the greedy Wall Street Execs made bad business decisions and are now trying to screw the taxpayers more than they already have.
@fanofgrendel: Rick Santelli is the man. Some people who have been responding to this (and the person who wrote it) need to take a few finance, accounting, and political science classes.
Rick Santelli is a scumbag. Calling out homeowners with bad mortages as losers, yet defending the lowlifes at AIG who used bailout money to pay their idiot executives, who sunk their company, with bonuses. He doesn't even have the stones to face Jon Stewart. Burn in hell Santelli, along with the AIG executives and the people on this board defending all this excrement!