Democrat Climate of Hate Leads to Death Threats Against AIG

Where's the outrage?

A tidal wave of public outrage over bonus payments swamped American International Group yesterday. Hired guards stood watch outside the suburban Connecticut offices of AIG Financial Products, the division whose exotic derivatives brought the insurance giant to the brink of collapse last year. Inside, death threats and angry letters flooded e-mail inboxes. Irate callers lit up the phone lines. Senior managers submitted their resignations. Some employees didn't show up at all.

"It's a mob effect," one senior executive said. "It's putting people's lives in danger."

Politicians and the public spent yesterday demanding that AIG rescind payouts that they said rewarded recklessness and greed at a company being bailed out with $170 billion in taxpayer funds. But company officials contend that the uproar is scaring away the very employees who understand AIG Financial Products' complex trades and who are trying to dismantle the division before it further endangers the world's economy.

"It's going to blow up," said a senior Financial Products manager, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for the company. "I have a horrible, horrible, horrible feeling that this is going to end badly."

What happened to the presumption of innocence?

Meanwhile, the man who was the recipient of the most money from Bernie Madoff is threatening to take away the bonuses.

"They should voluntarily return them (the bonuses). If they don't we plan to tax virtually all of it," Senator Charles Schumer, a member of the Democratic leadership, said in a speech on the Senate floor.

To date there's no evidence Schumer has given back the hundreds of thousands of dollars he took from Madoff while he was chairing the Democrat Senate Campaign Committee. Considering that was all dirty Madoff money, maybe we can arrange a special tax on it, or better yet, just confiscate all of it and put it toward a fund to reimburse Madoff's victim?

What say you, Chuckie?

Update: Just to make it crystal clear, here's a list of recipients of Madoff's money.For the record, the most recent donation paid while Schumer headed the DSCC:

MADOFF, BERNARD L
NEW YORK, NY 10022
BERNARD L. MADOFF INVEST.-SEC./CHAI
DEMOCRATIC SENATORIAL CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE (D)
$25,000
primary
09/12/08

Feel free to review the rest of them. Again, zero indication Schumer has returned Madoff's dirty money.

And he has the temerity to demand people who received contractually obligated bonuses hand them over.

The hypocristy meter has exploded.