March 2009 Archives

This week has certainly allowed our leaders in Washington to grandstand over the AIG bonus fiasco.  They gave quite a grilling to the new CEO of AIG, when in fact the bonus contracts were written before he came on board.  In fact Mr. Liddy is currently working for $1/year to fix AIG and could probably be considered a civil servant.  Should he be the focus of the outrage?  Rather isn't this more indicative (perhaps damning) of the whole Wall Street culture of questionable compensation?  Isn't this more indicative of the type of greed which evolved over the last 30 years which got us into this mess?

The "solution" they say is to tax bonuses at TARP supported companies a rate of 90%.  They aren't specifically targeting AIG, "just any TARP-supported company." What bothers me about the legislative "solution" is that it sets a dangerous precedent.  I'm no Constitutional lawyer (Can you say bill of attainder?), but this tax probably won't "claw back" the AIG bonuses.  It may instead create a situation where we punish outrages with targeted taxes.  Maybe we start taxing people at 90% who voted against us.  Maybe we start taxing people at 90% who work for tobacco companies or the entertainment industry.

Let's resolve to take a stand rather than a grandstand and fix the problems which allowed this situation to occur.  $165 million in "retention" bonuses is outrageous, but the real problem is about 10,000 times bigger.

Congratulations to Coach Scott Balboni and the Penn State Icers who finished a great season last night.  Unfortunately, their season ended with a 3-0 loss to Illinois in the semifinals of the ACHA Division I Championship.  Thirteen seniors played their last game last night including State College's own Andrew Magulick whom I had the pleasure to coach both as a PeeWee (9-11 years old) and when he was in High School.  I wish the seniors the best in whatever they choose to do.

I saw more games this year than I have in the last two.  Penn State swept Illinois in the last regular season series they played, but that didn't translate into success last night.  While I didn't listen to the game, after I saw the score, Battista's First Law of Hockey came to mind: "In hockey the best team always wins, unless the goalie stands on his head!"  Apologies to the hockey jargon impaired; no I can't explain it.  I'm not sure I understand what JoeBa's talking about myself.

Here's hoping future Icers teams are on the good side of goalie "head stands."