Looky here, you idiots who voted for Obama are being lied to every
day.  You're too damn stubborn to admit it.

Bill

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123777083390610069.html

Geithner Aides Worked With AIG for Months on Bonuses

By MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS and SUDEEP REDDY

WASHINGTON -- Since the fall, senior aides to Timothy Geithner have
closely dealt with American International Group Inc. on compensation
issues including bonuses, both from his time as president of the
Federal Reserve Bank of New York and as Treasury secretary.

The extent of their involvement, which wasn't widely known, raises
fresh questions about whether Mr. Geithner could have known earlier
about AIG's $165 million in bonus payments. When the bonuses sparked a
political firestorm last week, Mr. Geithner said he learned about
their full scope in early March, just days before they were paid.

Mr. Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke will be grilled
by Congress on Tuesday in a hearing that is likely to focus heavily on
AIG. The flap has prompted lawmakers to seek curbs on an array of
bonuses, tested the Obama administration and undermined Mr. Geithner's
standing as he attempts to implement measures to stabilize the
financial system.

Treasury officials say the department's staff kept Mr. Geithner in the
dark until March 10. "Secretary Geithner, who has been actively
engaged in shaping and executing the president's broad economic
agenda, takes full responsibility for not being aware of these
programs" before that date, Treasury spokesman Isaac Baker said Sunday
in a written response to questions.

This account of how Mr. Geithner and his aides were apprised of the
AIG bonuses was based on interviews with government officials,
lawmakers and congressional testimony.
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As New York Fed president, Mr. Geithner was central to AIG's initial
$85 billion bailout in September, which was carried out in a
tumultuous four-day period.

After Edward Liddy took over as AIG chief executive, the company hired
consultants to look at its payment plans around the world. One of Mr.
Geithner's top bank supervisors at the New York Fed, Sarah Dahlgren,
became the government's lead overseer of AIG. She sat in on AIG board
meetings, joined at times by other top Fed staffers, and also
participated in compensation-committee meetings. It isn't clear
whether the issue rose to the board level until this month.

AIG received an expanded government rescue in October and another in
November, bringing the total to about $150 billion, including $40
billion in Treasury funds.

In early November, the Fed, outside auditor Ernst & Young and AIG
officials began examining through a committee the bonuses set to be
paid to AIG's financial-products division, including those that
sparked last week's furor. The committee concluded that the bonuses,
which were in contracts signed before the government takeover,
couldn't be legally blocked, according to a person familiar with the
matter. The Obama administration has since agreed with that legal
interpretation.

AIG cited the retention plan in a public filing in early November, and
Fed officials were aware AIG planned to pay $55 million in bonuses to
financial-products employees the next month. Mr. Geithner remained
involved in major AIG matters, seeking updates from Ms. Dahlgren and
other top Fed staffers. He recused himself from dealing with aid to
specific companies around the time of his Nov. 24 nomination as
Treasury secretary.

Fed officials declined to make Ms. Dahlgren available to comment on
the bonus issue.

Lawmakers were also scrutinizing AIG's operations. Some raised the
matter of the AIG bonuses at a hearing in December where they grilled
Neel Kashkari, a Bush Treasury official who remains at the department.

In late January, news outlets reported that AIG planned a total of
$450 million in bonuses to help retain employees winding down the
complex trades in the unit at the heart of the company's collapse. In
the weeks that followed, Mr. Liddy and other AIG officials briefed
some lawmakers about the retention payments and other aspects of the
AIG rescue.

On Feb. 28, as government officials worked on a fourth AIG bailout,
the New York Federal Reserve Bank emailed Stephen Albrecht, a Treasury
lawyer, laying out the AIG bonus issues and promising further detail,
according to two people familiar with the email. Mr. Albrecht did not
return a call seeking comment.

It was an intense weekend, as Treasury and Fed officials frantically
prepared to close the AIG deal. "When we heard there was this
executive compensation thing floating out there, we thought, 'We'll
deal with this later,'" said one Treasury official.

On March 2, AIG announced both record losses and $30 billion in fresh
Treasury aid.

The following day, Mr. Geithner appeared at a hearing of the House
Ways and Means Committee. Rep. Joseph Crowley, a New York Democrat,
asked the secretary about more than $160 million in bonuses that AIG
would be paying to financial-products employees "in the coming weeks."

Treasury officials say the AIG problem didn't register with Mr.
Geithner at the hearing amid the other issues he faced. Mr. Baker, the
Treasury spokesman, acknowledged that information about the financial-
products bonuses was "in the public arena...for many months." But, he
said, it wasn't until March 10 -- five days before the big batch of
retention payments were due -- that department staff spelled out the
situation for the secretary.

The following day, March 11, Mr. Geithner, alert to the potential
political fallout, called Mr. Liddy to protest the bonus payouts. At a
congressional hearing last week, Mr. Liddy described the call as "open
and frank."

According to Mr. Liddy's sworn testimony from that hearing, Mr.
Geithner indicated on the call that he had learned about the bonus
"situation about a week" earlier.

A Treasury spokeswoman said Mr. Liddy was "wrong." An AIG spokeswoman
said the CEO was passing on his impression from the conversation. "If
that impression was incorrect, he certainly defers to the Treasury
secretary," she said.

Over the weekend, administration officials contended the uproar
wouldn't derail their efforts. President Barack Obama and a pair of
Republican senators -- Judd Gregg of New Hampshire and Charles
Grassley of Iowa, the top Republican on the Finance Committee --
disagreed with those calling for Mr. Geithner's resignation.