WASHINGTON (AP) - From the White House through the halls of Congress, Washington is losing its zeal for an all-out fight over hefty executive bonuses, now that it wants the financial companies it blames for the collapse of the U.S. economy to help clean up the mess.
Read it here.
Of course they're losing interest. The show trial of AIG execs has accomplished its purposes. It served to distract the public from the previous issue of discussion -- Obama's incompetence -- and allowed the Democrats to go on the attack against dat ol' debbil, capitalism. Time to move on to the next distraction, lest people start to again question the wisdom of the Young Messiah's policies.
One thing that needs to be pointed out before the subject is completely dropped, though. Commentator after commentator has described the attacks as an upwelling of "populism" and as such somehow illegitimate, but the whole affair was cooked up by political elites operating out of the White House and Congress, was sustained by the elite media, and served to deflect attention away from a real populist movement -- the nationwide tea protests. All in all, it has been a masterful exercise in political manipulation.
