American International Group–as well as the politicians responsible for supervising its federal bailout–struggled to respond to a firestorm of criticism leveled against the beleaguered company last week, generated by a brouhaha involving retention bonuses as well as controversy over its payments to various counterparties here and abroad.
Public rage–channeled through Congress, the White House and the media–focused primarily on $165 million in bonus payments to employees of AIG's Financial Products unit, which has been blamed for undermining the company's solvency and nearly taking down the entire financial system with reckless credit default swaps to cover subprime mortgage-based securities.
"For the American public, AIG now stands for Arrogance, Incompetence and Greed," said Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H.
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