AIG Outrage And A Silly Repug (S)Mack-Down

(Sorry, people – this is the best I can do without Photoshop.)

This story from HuffPo brings us the following from U.S. House Repug Connie Mack The Fourth of Florida…

"I've had serious concerns about Secretary Geithner from the moment he was nominated. In the months since, he has shown us time and again why he was the wrong choice for this critical post.

"This week's news on the AIG bonus scandal is but the latest fiasco under his watch and he has lost the confidence of the American people.

"Quite simply, the Timothy Geithner experience has been a disaster. The Treasury Department is in disarray. Taxpayer dollars are being wasted. America's economy hangs in the balance. America needs and deserves a Treasury Secretary who can truly lead us forward.

"Timothy Geithner should either resign or be fired for the good of the country, and President Obama should nominate a new Treasury Secretary with the experience and leadership skills America deserves."

Far be it for me to defend Treasury Secretary Geithner or his pal Larry Summers (I mean, are these guys going to set a new record for the Guinness book when it comes to shoveling good money after bad? As I asked yesterday, what the $#@! happened to the original TARP – you know, the one where we get the toxic assets off the books first and THEN see what happens?), but if Connie Mack The Fourth wants little Timmeh outta here, then I guess he’s gonna have to Wait Until Tomorrow (Besides, what about these people? Aren’t they guilty of building Castles Made Of Sand too? And I mean, in addition to Dubya and Paulson, Shelby, Cantor, McConnell, etc.).

So, all of this made me a bit curious about Connie Mack The Fourth, so I did a little digging and found out that, like every other House Repug, he opposed the stimulus, even though the governor of Florida, Repug Charlie Crist, actually has a brain and a sense of responsibility to the point where he supported it (here), even though Mack sayeth as follows…

“The people of Southwest Florida, and indeed the nation, want to see a plan that will get our economy moving, not a plan that is chock-full of spending for pork and special interests.”

As “Creative Loafing” (love the title) notes, though…

It is especially hilarious to hear Mack call for more unfettered growth, since he represents one of the worst cases of overbuilding and speculation without proper growth management down in Lehigh Acres. The New York Times wrote of the place: “In Lehigh Acres, homes are selling at 80 percent off their peak prices. Only two years after there were more jobs than people to work them, fast-food restaurants are laying people off or closing. Crime is up, school enrollment is down, and one in four residents received food stamps in December, nearly a fourfold increase since 2006.”

But Mack depends on those landowners and developers for his campaign cash, and since he’s mulling a U.S. Senate run, he wants to push his “conservative” credentials against the president’s stimulus plan. Since when did being a conservative equate to being a land-rush huckster?

When, indeed?

And by the way, this contains more interesting reading on Mack The Fourth, including the details of a $10 million earmark inserted into a 2005 transportation bill; see, Mack officially didn’t know about the earmark since it was inserted by Transportation Committee Chairman Don Young (yes, that Don Young, who is seeing his patronage House Burning Down) on behalf of Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) and real estate developer Daniel Aronoff’s Landon Companies, who…

“…had paid Potomac partners, a lobbying firm, $140,000 since 2005 and $580,000 since 2003, respectively. Aronoff helped organize a fundraiser honoring Young, but Mack was involved in hosting it. Earlier that day both congressmen attended a town hall meeting on the FGCU campus. Topics for the event according to a notice included a study commissioned by FGCU that recommended the construction of an interchange at Coconut Road and I-75 in addition to a high-tech command and control center that would be located on the FGCU campus. Minutes from the meeting stated that Young was invited to the university by Mack.”

Nice, cozy little setup Mack and Young had here; Ain’t No Telling what these guys would have gotten away with, huh?

Oh, and by the way, Mack is married to (The Wind Cries) Mary Bono, for the record (when it comes to keeping Repug patronage in the family, “the beat goes on,” I guess).

(OK, no more music references…)

So, yeah, there are legitimate questions that must be asked about who exactly knew of the bonuses to be awarded to AIG and who signed off on them, and I realize that the issues are tricky because, as Press Secretary Robert Gibbs among others has pointed out, the contracts were signed in April 2008 before Lehman Brothers fell in September (though not before Bear Stearns merged with J.P. Morgan in March).

But when it comes to faux populist outrage from characters like Mack The Fourth (as noted above, he’s positioning himself for a Senate run at Mel Martinez’s seat, since Mack The Third served there), it’s the same old song (don’t know if that was a Hendrix cover or not – he wasn’t real big on Motown, as I recall).

(And right after I pressed Enter on this, I saw that Darrell Issa joined the party; Issa is a world-class scumwaffle, whereas Mack The Fourth is only a piker.)

Update: Not good, Timmeh (and despite Jed L.'s thorough post, it doesn't look good for Dodd either - Update 3/19: Upon further consideration, though, Dodd deserves credit for trying to limit the amount of the bonuses, as noted here; it would have been a slippery legal slope to try and remove them altogether, as much as I hate to admit that).

Update 3/20/09: Terrific question from Jed L. here...