Oh, the Hypocrisy!

While trying not to laugh at Obama’s righteous indignation over the exorbitant bonuses paid out to Wall Street executives this month, I noticed a very curious, though not surprising irony. Now, don’t misunderstand. I don’t particularly like the fact that these companies, which have received billions of dollars in federal bailout money, are paying out ridiculous bonuses to their employees. In light of the fact that bonuses are usually given to reflect a high level of performance in one’s industry, it’s more than a little idiotic to hand out six-figure awards to folks who just lost their clients billions of dollars in investments.

After the year all of us have had, watching our investments plummet, I can understand how the average 401k owner might feel when he or she hears about their broker getting a new Porsche. I would say that this is supposed to be a free-market economy, where the government has no business telling private companies what to do with their own money, but then this isn’t their own money, is it? And it’s debatable at best whether or not this is a free market economy any more. Behold, the dangers of accepting government intervention.

But regardless of your opinions on whether our new president’s outrage is indeed righteous or not, you can’t help but admire the arrogant hypocrisy that is evident in our great messiah’s lack of an equal amount of outrage over the behavior of the UAW. Last time I checked, these geniuses plan to demand that their union members keep getting paid the ridiculous wages, an average of over $70 an hour including benefits, that got General Motors into this mess to begin with. And what will General Motors be using to maintain this level of remuneration? Well it’s patently obvious that they can’t sustain it on their own, so it’ll be the bailout money provided by you and I that allows UAW members to keep drawing a salary completely out of proportion to their labor.

Where’s the outrage over that? Why should Wall Streeters have to change their excessive ways, when the UAW is still forcing exorbitant wages out of GM, Ford, and Chrysler? Apparently, it’s okay for Big Labor to take a government-funded bailout and use it for disproportionate compensation, but not Wall Street. Does that make as much sense to you as it does to me? Well, it makes perfect sense when you realize the Big Labor unions spent millions upon millions to help put Barack Obama in the White House.

They own him. He’s their bitch.

(You know, I'll be in the market for a car sometime in the next few months. Better believe it won't be a product of GM. In fact, I'm liking Toyota more and more these days. Buy non-union.)