Is Obama Finally Taking On The Bad Guys?

If not him... who? If not now... when?

So let me ask again, is Obama starting to get tough on the selfish assholes who have taken it upon themselves to stand in the way of Change and Hope Americans voted for last year? If so-- it's about frickin' time! Greed has certainly been running as rampant under his administration as it did under the previous one-- long considered the worst in the nation's history. Yesterday I listened to a radio report on the Administration's plans to enforce truth-labeling rules and the First lady's attempts to talk up healthy nutrition for children-- a real security concern in a country where so many young people are obese that the military is freaking out and the health care industry is drowning in a sea of fat-- only to have the CEO of Coca Cola attack the endeavors! Similarly a report on CNN about the Baltimore school district's lauditory Meatless Monday program included an hysterical sociopath from the American Meat Institute calling down the wrath of God. God didn't respond, but Satan did-- in the form of his not so humble servant, Lou Dobbs, calling the program "unhealthy indoctrination." If I have to tell you what the insurance companies, the lobbyists and Fox News have been trying to do to scuttle health care reform, you've been asleep for the past several months.

What do all these things have in common? Change can be painful and when the status quo is threatened, the selfish and greedy (and powerful) react, regardless of the well-being of society at large. We elected Obama president, and by a helft margin at that, because we liked the whole Change theme. And now we expect to see some actual, tangible change, and not just a crooked Wall Street Bush hack like Paulsen being exchanged for a crooked Wall Street Clinton hack like Summers.

Treasury Department watchdog, the inspector general of TARP, Neil Barofsky made clear today that Change is not what we're seeing so far. In terms of his end of the world, everything is pretty much as screwed up and gamed for the rich and powerful as it was when Bush and his cronies were running the show. "The American people's belief that the funds went into a black hole," he warned, "or that there was a transfer of wealth from taxpayers to Wall Street, is one of the worst outcomes of this program, and that is the reputational damage to the government." Listen to his assessment:



Perhaps in anticipation of Barofsky's report today, the Obama "pay czar," Kenneth Feinberg, cut the compensation for the CEOs and top mangement staff (25 highest paid executives) of the seven companies that got the biggest federal bailouts.

Under the plan, which will be announced in the next few days by the Treasury Department, the seven companies that received the most assistance will have to cut the cash payouts to their 25 best-paid executives by an average of about 90 percent from last year. For many of the executives, the cash they would have received will be replaced by stock that they will be restricted from selling immediately.

And for the 25 best-paid executives, the total compensation, which includes bonuses, will drop, on average, by about 50 percent.

The companies are Citigroup, Bank of America, the American International Group, General Motors, Chrysler and the financing arms of the two automakers.

...And at all of the companies, any executive seeking more than $25,000 in special perks-- like country club memberships, private planes, limousines or company issued cars-- will have to apply to the government for permission. The administration will also warn A.I.G. that it must fulfill a commitment it made to significantly reduce the $198 million in bonuses promised to employees in the financial products division.