Barack? Are you There?

I'm definitely a little hot over the news that AIG execs are going to be the beneficiaries of 165 million of our dollars for their ... hard work? I guess. But what has me even more upset is the way our government -- again -- looks as though it just has absolutely no fucking clue what it's doing. Observe these bits of Tuesday's New York Times lead story:

The Treasury and Federal Reserve officials said they had known about the bonus program as far back as last fall.

Seems like a long time ...

The program has provoked public protests from a handful of critics and at least one Democratic lawmaker in Congress — Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, a member of the House Committee on Government Oversight ...

Outstanding! An oversight dude to keep track of what's up and let people know that this is happening.

Mr. Cummings said he had been communicating regularly with A.I.G.’s chief executive, Edward M. Liddy, about the bonuses ever since December. Mr. Cummings said he was particularly concerned that the bonuses were supposed to be paid by March 15, adding that he assumed Treasury officials had the same worries.

“I assumed that they were well aware of it and would take appropriate action” before the March 15 deadline, Mr. Cummings said.

Ahh yes. The old assume routine.

Mr. Cummings said. “In light of the biggest quarterly loss in history, you would think that A.I.G. and Mr. Liddy would have been able to convince folks who were supposed to be getting these retention payments, based at least in part on performance, that they might want to voluntarily not take all or part of them.”

What the fuck? Are you kidding me? You think this Liddy guy can walk into a room full of people expecting their fat ass checks and say, "Look, I know you have a contractual right to this cash -- which I am holding right here in front of you! -- but the economy has tanked pretty badly and there's not much money to go around anymore, so why don't you be a pal and forgo this awesome bonus that will help you pay off your staggeringly huge mortgage, huh?"

Also, wouldn't you think the current state of the economy and AIG make AIG employees more likely to want to get as much money as they can as soon as possible?

But administration officials said that the Treasury secretary, Timothy F. Geithner, did not personally become aware until last week that an even bigger round of payments was due on March 15. Administration officials said Mr. Geithner learned of the deadline early last week, when the Federal Reserve Bank of New York alerted him that the bonus payments were coming due.

How this man -- who heads the organization that owns 80 percent of AIG -- could not know about these bonuses amazes me.

A.I.G. executives said they would never have proceeded with the bonus payments before getting approval from the Treasury and the Federal Reserve.

“We would never make any important business decisions without discussing them with our government managers and owners,” said one executive, who did not want to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.

So somebody knew, but nobody knows who knew.

Both agencies have insisted that neither of them [the Treasury or Federal Reserve] “owns” A.I.G., or controls its management decisions, even though the federal government owns almost 80 percent of the company. As a result, the Treasury and Fed officials have repeatedly resisted forcing the company to disclose more about how A.I.G. was spending taxpayer money.

I can't believe the government could give away so much of our money and just have no idea what is going to be done with it. They own 80 percent of this company now, but nobody knows who is in charge! Obama needs to get a handle on this shit before his ass gets racked up as someone who can't control his government.