Why aren’t assets being seized for business bailouts?

Fannie Mae ’s former CEO, Franklin Raines has actually been called to the carpet as recently as 3 years ago for manipulaitng financial reports, and was eventually had charges brought against him to reclaim some of the money that he obtained as a result of this intentional misreporting.  The end result was his dumping a bunch of then worthless stock options, and for him and some of his colleagues to pay roughly 3 million dollars in fines and restitution.  In 2003 alone, Raines’s compensation was over $20 million.

Why is it that we, as a country, continue to allow people who deliberately break the law to keep the bulk of their riches even after they’ve destroyed the company they were trusted with?  Why should these compensations be any different than cars, houses, and money seized from drug dealers?  Both are breaking the law on a very large scale and both are damaging communities in the United States.

This latest bailout/purchase of Lehman, sullied by Golden Parachutes once again, is symptomatic of the assumption of entitlement for CEOs and high level management all across the country.  At the very best, these men allowed their institutions to fail, and should not be rewarded.  At worst, they allowed the largest economy in the world to be placed squarely into danger of collapsing.  This kind of activity should not be accepted, and in my opinion the damage caused by the willful profiteering of these men and others like them is much more harmful to many more people than many crimes which are prosecuted much more harshly.

These men need to be held accountable for their actions within the corporation.  As much as the corporation exists to protect the individuals within it from liability, we need to ensure that when there is wrongdoing, there is punishment.  These men do not care about the institutions they ruined, they did not care for the American people (and people all over the world!) who invested in them, they only cared for themselves.  They were able to take this position, because they knew that they would not be punished.  Their powerful and well connected legislators, bought and paid for, would never allow anything to happen to them…and surely the “government” would bail them out. In this case, and in ALL cases, the Government IS the people.  We are forced to pay for a mistake that we never made but there are people responsible.  These people ought to face the American people in court and have an appropriate punishment given to them.  

More and more, it seems that there really isn’t equal protection under the law.  If I am one day late paying my car registration, I am forced to pay a hefty reinstatement fee, and I will be under the threat of being pulled over and more fully punished.  If these men bankrupt a company that is of International significance they are given enormous bonuses.  Is that fair, to anyone?

If we have the resources to enforce jaywalking laws, we certainly have the resources to audit these companies, and not just management, but employees all the way down to loan officers, and even home buyers who lied about their income.