Timeline reveals Presidential and Democratic party undue dilligence, incompetence and/or duplicity worthy of a Gate-like scandal

Senator Barack Obama’s campaign contributions from AIG prior to Election Day 2008 may be irrelevant to his subsequent actions and inactions as President and President-Elect.

But it would seem a passing strange coincidence that the Illinois Democrat’s $101,332 “bonus” from AIG was second only to the $103,100 received by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT), whose eponymous Amendment to the stimulus bill exempted corporate retention bonuses from Congressional bailout restrictions that were vested in 2008.

Given the outrage over the, just announced to the public over the weekend, AIG bonuses and subsequent revelations of Treasury dealings with AIG since the initial bailout last year and especially Dodd’s Amendment protecting the bonuses, President Obama obviously sensed the need to refute the obvious implication that he must have known about them. But, in trying to pass the buck, the following attempted exoneration actually indicts President Obama as even more responsible for the outrage:

On March 9, 2009, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York sent full details and supporting documentation to the Treasury Department about the Financial Products retention program.

One day later, Geithner was told about the $165 million in bonuses.

“Everyone knew that there were retention bonuses on the books,” an Obama administration source said, “but no one (in the Obama administration) knew about the $165 million for the Financial Products division” until March 5.

A look at the AIG timeline reveals the above as what what my fellow criminal defense lawyers call an “admission against interest”, and while many may find the payment of millions to AIG employees as outrageous in a civil sense, the trillions committed by Obama and the Democrats to non-stimulative bailouts and fundamental changes to America while delaying action to fix the credit crunch can only be regarded as criminally outrageous.

The timeline:

September 16, 2008 $85B to AIG – first bailout installment

November 2008 Treasury learns of existence of retention contracts but not details

February 2009 Dodd Amendment exempting AIG bonuses from restrictions inserted in Stimulus bill

February 11, 2009 Obama signs Stimulus bill

March 2, 2009 Obama grants latest $30B bailout installment to AIG

March 5, 2009 Obama learns bonuses are $165B

March 9, 2009 Treasury learns full details of bonuses

We assume President Obama read the stimulus bill before signing? He either knew of the Dodd Amendment or he didn’t.

If he didn’t know of the Amendment, then he didn’t do his due diligence and is guilty of mass incompetence.

If he did know of the Amendment, and signed the bill anyway, knowing of the ongoing investigations by Treasury and the Fed of AIG into the details of the retention contract bonuses, then he did not do his due diligence and is guilty of massive incompetence.

The bottom line is that President Barack Obama is responsible for the AIG retention contract bonuses since he signed the Stimulus Bill that made exempting the AIG bonuses matter of U.S. Law!

Add to this fact, that given that the United States owns 80% of AIG stock, President Obama is the de facto CEO of AIG.

Add to that fact, his prior bonuses from AIG when he was a candidate, and we may soon be referring to this matter as a Nixonian ObamAIG-gate, with Chris Dodd as John Dean.

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Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Examiner.com and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published by Mike DeVine, Legal Editor for The Minority Report