November 11, 2008

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11/10/08 - A Pennsylvania Reader Urges Mitt Romney For Treasury Secretary

New York Democrat, Former AIG Employee, Says Company Put “International” First

From: Lysander Spooner (e-mail him)

Re: John Miano’s Column: Obscenities, Chaos, H-1Bs And High Reported Earnings—My Year With AIG

Until September 15, now known as "Black Monday," like Miano I worked for AIG in its asset management arm, AIG Investments.

I was on the proposal-writing team—hardly the most illustrious or well-paid group in the firm.

We had a team offsite in Mumbai, and were flown there on Emirates Airline business class and put up at the luxurious Taj Palace Hotel to discuss items that could have been covered in a conference call. The trip was great—a dream vacation I could never have afforded for myself—and cost the company at least a million dollars.

The company is a pit of waste. I can only imagine the excesses that went on the higher levels of the company. AIG needs to be dismantled entirely.

Until Miano’s column, what has been under-reported in the AIG mess is that the company definitely put the "International" in its name first.

It was common in the elevators at the New York headquarters to hear Hindi spoken as the primary language. Almost every single IT person at the firm was an H1-B visa holder from South Asia.

Included among the “highlights” of our multicultural work force were a Taiwanese who walked around telling everyone how he evaded taxes and saying that he wanted the IRS to be blown up, adding that IRS employees needed to die or before they could start taxing people again.

I noted to him that it unwise, five blocks from Ground Zero, openly to pray for the annihilation of US government workers, but he ignored me. I wonder how well I would do in Taiwan if I expressed similar sentiments.

Another senior IT worker from India used the low sink in the handicapped stall in the bathroom to clean himself after defecation, as AIG did not provide lotas for employee use. When he finished, the stall would be soaked with traces of his ablutions clearly visible.

Now, the latest outrage, AIG is getting a larger, more favorably structured bailout loan for an aggregate of $152 billion. This comes directly on the heels of an announced $25 billion third quarter 2008 loss.[AIG, US Reach New Terms, by David Goldman, CNNMoney, November 10, 2008]

The idea that anyone at this company, or any other company that has received public capital, may receive a bonus this year is despicable.

The bailout of the financial industry is clearly just a giveaway to the wealthy, and is a complete disaster. Americans must awaken and realize that our kleptocratic rulers are robbing us blind.

Call Congress to demand that all bonuses and dividends that may be paid out to these incorrigibles at AIG and other financial institutions be cancelled. [Money Really Is Fungible, Editorial, New York Times, November 8, 2008]

Spooner says that like many of his Democratic friends, he is “on to the immigration scam”.