So much stupidity and no time to write…

Los Angeles, CA - Based on bits and pieces of various news items I've managed to catch over the couple weeks I've managed to figure out a few things.

We have some moron in Congress wanting to tax executive bonuses at 90%. There is another set of morons wanting to go after bonuses already paid out to people working for companies that accepted government money. Some combination of those congressional idiots wants to stop payouts of bonus money earned under the terms of employment contracts.

I'm not all that happy about CEOs getting multi-million dollar bonuses from a failing company. The problem is the terms of the contracts requires they be paid. The government bailed the company out and it did not fail. Therefore all those employment contracts are still valid enforceable by the courts if need be.

If we would have let the companies fail, we wouldn't be having this little tiff, would we?

Other members of Congress are hot to trot to limit executive compensation of corporations accepting government money to a grand total of $500,000 per year. Charley Wrangle, in his infinite capacity for complete ignorance, is proposing a bill that would extend the proposed executive salary cap to every corporation, not just the corporations accepting government money.

Yet another group of USDA Grade A Congressional idiots believes they can pass a law allowing bankruptcy judges to rewrite the terms of home mortgages to make them more favorable to the home owner. 

What do all these things have in common? They've all been tried in the past. Mostly during the Great Depression. Those laws that actually passed into law were promptly turned over by the courts. The high taxes simply drove desperately needed capitol of shore.

Companies that took government money accepted their own special brand of Hell. They deserve what ever happens to them for getting into bed with the US Government. There is no such thing as a quid without a pro quo when businesses, states, cities and counties accept government handouts.

For the rest of US Business, those that remained free and clear of government money and the sticky strings that go with it, none of these proposed steps into totalitarianism will stand a constitutional test.

From unconstitutional takings to running afoul the equal treatment provisions, each and everyone of these asinine will be struck down almost as fast as Congress can pass them. I think there is a one of three chance that even the companies on the government bail out programs will find some relief from the courts.

Alas, I would love to spend an afternoon researching all these things, getting quotes and finding case law on the matter. But the current job simply has not allowed the time. In fact my current time sheet shows a total of 181.5 hours over the last ten days ending yesterday.

Maybe later…

- 30 -

"These two entities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not facing any kind of financial crisis. The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

- Representative Barney Frank (D-MA), the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee.