They just cannot understand why people are so angry at having to pay these people bonuses for sticking around to undo the damage that they've done to this country. They have no duty, no allegiance, no sense of obligation and responsiblity to anyone or anything but themselves.

They're suing the U.S. taxpayers for a return of overpaid taxes (according to them) for their own overevalutation of their income to protect the fact that their bottom line was chimera, a false image to boost their own profitablity and attraction to investors. Now, because of their greed, their chicanery, their downright thievery, they have the chutzpah to demand that money back.

They get on their private jets and fly to Washington D.C. to ask lawmakers, at the expense of the American taxpayer, to fashion a welfare program explicitly for them, not because they're starving in the streets, or they lost money in sacrifice to the country, but because of their own stupidity and greed and then complain when they are held to the standards of the contract that they entered into with the taxpayers of this country. It states specifically in that contract, that executives' compensation is subject to the review and sanctions of the lawmakers themselves.

These people are welfare recipients, they are like every other welfare recipient in this country subject to the rules and regulations of that program.

To obtain a tax advantage, they took the gamble of deferring their 2008 income tax until 2009. When you take that kind of gamble, you are subject to the taxes of the year in which the income is paid, not the year for which it is earned. This income is not only subject to the tax code of 2009, it is subject to the review of congress, which they readily agreed to when they asked for the bailout.

These people have received unprecedented tax breaks, bailouts and advantages that the office worker that was just laid off because of their rank greed and stupidity does not have. He has no place to go to receive a bailout, he has no advantage of deferring his income to lessen his tax burden, he sees his entire future being swallowed up by these carrion - I'm surprised he's not more angry than he is.

Now I don't expect these incredibly greedy little pigs to take responsibility for what they've done, but the very least they can do is stop whining about the rules they agreed to when they took the money.

AIG is willing to accept the welfare payments but thinks it doesn't have to abide by the rules that other welfare recipients do. I suppose that's because they took a private jet to sign up instead of the bus.

It no longer matters if we think the Czech president of the EU is a rightwing clown, it matters what the EU thinks - and does. There is going to be intense pressure by the EU which sees its advantage in our economic downfall in replacing the dollar standard with the EURO. The more dollars we pump into the world system the more worthless it becomes. The EU is going to hunker down, watch us spend ourselves silly and then pounce.

"WE WELCOME EUROS" will be the sign next to the cash register at your neighborhood McDonald's...

p.s. They already run the show.

First, stop lobbying and lobbyists. For one thing it is nothing more than legalized bribery and blackmail and no new ideas or dead ideas can be thought or rethought as long as we have powerful self interests protecting those ideas from consideration.

Second, enact term limits on congress. As long as powerful members of congress are being supported by lobbies and lobbyists and both are interested only in self-preservation there is no possiblity that meaningful change can be enacted. Congressional office was never meant to be a career option with pensions and benefits which in itself is corrupting and dispiriting and encourages hunkering down in the past.

Third, we must have open and real accounting both in government and business and especially where the two cross the line that supposedly separate the two. If we don't know how much money we have, how much money we spend and how much money we owe there is no way to gauge the efficacy of any ideas, new or old. As long as costs can be hidden, the people are at the mercy of those holding that information. Do we really know if Social Security is going to be 50 trillion dollars short in 75 years? No, we don't, because there is no true accounting and anyone with an axe to grind is free to choose whatever numbers best suit his/her argument for or against it.

Fourth, we need direct election of the president, public and limited financing of the campaign and limited time in which campaigning can take place. Now, by the time the election takes place the candidate is beholden to more and more of the special interest groups that have financed the campaign. It is the snowball that becomes the avalanche that wipes out all intentions of change and duty to country. The money class becomes the true constituents, not the citizens of the country.

Fifth, while you can't have taxation without representation, you also can't have representation without taxation. Everyone, including corporations must pay a fair share, so the moving of taxable entities offshore must be stopped immediately. Who knows? We may be able to fund new ideas and ditch dead ideas if we have an equitable and fair taxing system. We could infuse schools right away with new funds if tax abatements for businesses were prohibited - we all have a vested interest in educating citizens so why shouldn't we all pay for it? Local school boards don't work because they're hostages to teachers' unions, they don't work because the people don't care, don't attend meetings unless they have some particular axe to grind and have no idea as what school boards are responsible for or what they do. Why call for nationalizing schools when people have no idea as to how schools are funded now?

Sixth, stop beating dead horses. Without real, systemic change, we will never have reform and without reform there can be no flexibility in assessing and re-assessing programs - enacting new ideas and the rethinking of dead ideas is futile and nothing more than beating dead horses if there is no mechanism for change. Every few years in the business community some new trend in management rears its head - mission statements, road plans, innovative management styles and do you know what happens? Nothing. Nothing changes, the business/corporation goes on exactly as it always has because people who become entrenched in the business are too afraid to innovate and change. The higher they rise in the business, the longer they are there, the more reason they have to keep the system they have. The government is exactly the same - the same people, deeply entrenched in the system, all educated at the same schools with the same network of connections manage it (which is why the senate looks like a geriatric daycare center) and have no impetus to change, in fact they are deeply afraid of it. That is why every single candidate goes to D.C. after promising the constituents that he will go there to change it, finds that the system will not allow change and because the system is too powerful, they are afraid to try.

It's great to call for rethinking and changing our way of thinking, but until the system changes, there is no point in it.