Shameless and Blameless.

Like any other large swamp dwelling reptile.

Robert Scheer:

It is instructional that only one of the three tax-challenged Obama appointees has survived public scorn to retain a high position in the new administration. Oddly enough, it is Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the man who will collect our taxes, whose career has not been stunted by his failure to pay them.

What makes Geithner so special? The answer, provided by everyone from the president to the media pundits, is that his services are indispensable because he has the expertise in regulating markets needed to preside over the most massive government intervention in the economy. Are they kidding?

Both in his years in the Clinton treasury and as chair of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, Geithner has been paving the way for a runaway Wall Street. Nor has he changed his ways, as was evidenced once again last week with his appointment of Mark Peterson, a Goldman Sachs vice president and lobbyist, to be his top aide. Peterson had lobbied strenuously for precisely the deregulation that the Obama administration now concedes needs reversing. It was confirmation that Goldman Sachs runs the Treasury Department—no matter which party is in power...

Meanwhile, the financial meltdown continues to be Mission Accomplished for the Right Thinking Amerika, a.k.a. the military-industrial complex:

Wind and solar power have been growing at a blistering pace in recent years, and that growth seemed likely to accelerate under the green-minded Obama administration. But because of the credit crisis and the broader economic downturn, the opposite is happening: installation of wind and solar power is plummeting...

or

Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) — citing “obstacles” such as the economy, energy legislation, Iraq and Afghanistan, and the deficit — said at a conference today that health care reform is unlikely to happen this year. As Finance Committee Chairman, Baucus plays a key role in pushing through health care legislation...

or

WASHINGTON — Senator Judd Gregg, named by President Obama on Tuesday as the choice for commerce secretary, once supported eliminating the department he is to lead. He differs with his boss-to-be in favoring oil drilling on the coast of an Alaska wildlife refuge. He promotes a lighter touch with China than does the president. And he disagrees with him in backing private accounts for Social Security...

When you lay down with large reptiles, Mr. Obama, you had best expect to be a bed time snack.

But, you know, Obama is treating this $eriously:

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is expected to impose a cap of $500,000 for top executives at companies that receive large amounts of bailout money, according to people familiar with the plan.

Executives would also be prohibited from receiving any bonuses above their base pay, except for normal stock dividends.

Executives at companies that have already received money from the Treasury Department would not have to make any changes...

How harsh. Obama is a bailout Nazi: No more billion dollar bonuses for you! One is enough!

And Wall Street is really into some pouty kabuki about this, too:

...“That is pretty draconian — $500,000 is not a lot of money, particularly if there is no bonus,” said James F. Reda, founder and managing director of James F. Reda & Associates, a compensation consulting firm...

Mr. Reda said only a handful of big companies pay chief executives and other senior executives $500,000 or less in total compensation. He said such limits will make it hard for the companies to recruit and keep executives, most of whom could earn more money at other firms.

“It would be really tough to get people to staff” companies that are forced to impose these limits, he said. “I don’t think this will work.”

Yes, it would be so hard to get people willing to lose everyone else's money in a socially correct way for $500,000 a year.



The more things Change, the more they stay the strange.