The weekly Political Whore Podcast (the “HoCast”) is ready for your enjoyment. We had a great session that started off with a listen to the Free Republic’s Kristinn Taylor exhort the patriots at the Orlando Tea Party this weekend.
In testimony in front of a House subcommittee, AIG Chairman and CEO Edward Liddy dropped this gem that was not in his prepared remarks: He has asked all AIG employees getting bonuses above $100,000 to return half of the money.
“I’ve asked the employees of AIG financial products to step up and do the right thing,” Liddy told the panel this afternoon. “Specifically I’ve asked those who received retention payments in excess of $100,000 or more to return at least half of those payments, some have already stepped forward and offered to give up 100 percent of their payments.”
You can read my earlier post about his prepared remarks, and download them in their entirety, at this link.
And here’s a video excerpt from Liddy’s testimony.
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Edward Liddy, public enemy No. 1 in today’s hypernews cycle, is set to testify in front of a Congressional subcommittee about the millions of tax-subsidized dollars that are being paid to AIG employees as a thank you for tanking the company and forcing a taxpayer bailout. Liddy is AIG’s chairman and CEO since late last year, and let’s make this clear, he didn’t create the mess there; he is trying to clean it up at the request of our government.
Nonetheless, the public demands a head, and today, that head is Ed’s.
From Liddy’s prepared remarks, these gems:
Mistakes were made at AIG on a scale few coudl have ever imagined possible. The most critical of those mistakes was that the company strayed from its core competencies in the insurance business. This was typified by the creation of what grew to become an internal hedge fund, which then became substantially overexposed to market risk.
And:
Former Tampa Tribune reporter and LakelandLocal.com blogger Billy Townsend joined me and Alexandra Koutsogiannopolous, a friend of mine from poli sci grad school at USF and the director of programs at the Tampa Bay chapter of the United Nations Association-USA, for our weekly ‘HoCast taping today. Here are the results.
I don’t know which is better: Joe Scarborough saying “fuck you” live on MSNBC or Mike Barnacle’s mouth-agape expression right after it happens. Keep up the good work, Joe.
