Over the weekend, one of the big stories was these AIG bonuses. If you'll remember, AIG has received three government bailouts totaling $180 billion. But yesterday, the company paid out $165 million in bonuses to employees. The fact that AIG had to pay millions in bonuses, considering its massive failings, has politicians irate. Politicians don't get irate when millions of dollars are spent by government on blueberry research or lobster farms .. but let the private sector pay that type of money pursuant to a contract and all hell breaks loose. We're certainly not at all shocked to find that one of the ticked-off politicians is none other than Barney Frank. He says that we need to figure out whether or not these bonuses are "legally recoverable." Barney wants to know, "Who said and at what point, 'We're going to give these bonuses no matter what.' And I do think it's inappropriate for those people to stay in power at that company."

Hey Barney ... some taxpayers out here might want to know whether some of the pork you clowns throw around to buy votes is legally recoverable as well. Remember - if you had to put the blame for this economic mess we're facing right now on just one person in Washington, that person would, without a doubt, be Slobbering Barney. Maybe someday we'll get the full story about Barney protecting his boyfriend who worked at Fannie Mae while this mess was building.

AIG Chairman Edward Liddy says that "the firm was legally obligated to make already-committed 2008 employee-retention payments, the value of which were set early last year before problems at its Financial Products unit became public."

Here's the new reality my friends. Government can seize and spend as much as it wants where it wants and when it wants. The private sector? Not so much. God forbid a company should reward performance. Rewarding performance is something very foreign to politicians and they don't like it. They're used to punishing performance, not rewarding it. The private sector rewards performance and punishes failure .. just the opposite for Barney and his clown circus.