Posted on 03/16/2009 3:51:36 PM PDT by governsleastgovernsbest
Somewhere Ron Ziegler is laughing . . .
Pres. Nixon’s feisty late press secretary would have to tip his hat to Robert Gibbs for the brazen stonewall he put up today to Jake Tapper’s line of questioning on what the Obama administration knew about the AIG bonuses and when they knew it. Tapper’s basic point was this: instead of trying to stop the bonuses now, when the administration is in a relatively weak bargaining position, why didn’t the administration demand that the bonuses be killed as a condition for the granting of the latest billions in bailout money given to AIG only a couple weeks ago?
As you’ll see from the ABC transcript, Tapper ventured no fewer than 11 questions going to the point. But Gibbs had the smoke-and-dust machine turned to ‘high,’ and never gave a straight answer. The strong of stomach can view the video for the full exchange. Credit Tapper for his persistence. With a recalcitrant press secretary before him and a roomful of impatient reporters behind him, it took chutzpah to hang in there. CNN’s Ed Henry gets a major assist: after Jake eventually had to yield the floor, Henry asked a follow-up on the same subject, and eventually Gibbs had to give some ground, saying he’d “ask the Treasury” why Geithner didn’t review the bonus-granting contracts before cutting the latest check to AIG.
View video here.
(Excerpt) Read more at finkelblog.com ...
‘Stonewall’ Robert Gibbs ping to Today show list.
I wish I had contractually provided bonuses at my job. I don’t even have base pay reduction protection. :(
I got “video not found”.
Glad to see Tapper’s still going after ‘em.
Hadn’t heard anything from him for awhile. (Not that I’m exactly glued to press conferences starring Bambi’s buttboy Gibbs.)
Good luck getting anything out of the Zero Team, though, Jake.
What do you want to bet that every single one of the execs that got a bonus is a heavy contributor to the ‘Rats.
I just tried it and it worked fine. Please try again and let me know if you have a problem:
http://finkelblog.com/index.php/2009/03/16/gibbs-stonewalls-on-prior-knowledge-of-aig-bonuses/
>> contractually provided bonuses
Isn’t that an oxymoron?
Well, it could be a contractual bonus based on, say, profitability or something. That would make sense.
...oh, wait...
Jake Tapper is turning out to be one of the good guys. Go get ‘em Jake!
Gibbs should have told the truth—if we had done that, we wouldn’t have been able to demagogue the issue, duh!!!
Most.ImmatureAmateur.Presidential.Administration.Ever. (After Clinton Inc, that's really saying something).
Everyone knows this bailout bs is all about political paybacks both here and abroad.
Just seeing a still photo of Gibbs is enough to turn my stomach.
>> Jake Tapper is turning out to be one of the good guys. Go get ‘em Jake!
Jake Tapper is just being a JOURNALIST. Cynical and adversarial towards EVERYONE.
Real journalists like Jake were what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they wrote freedom of the press into the Bill of Rights — not the biased, agenda driven pseudo-journalist infotainment losers we’re overrun with now.
>> Just seeing a still photo of Gibbs is enough to turn my stomach.
There’s something about his chinless little junior-high-school dweeb face that just makes me want to smack it as hard as I can with a dodgeball.
I’d gladly run a few extra laps for that privilege.
ya know. whats more outrageous employees that are given ‘bonus’ money in lieu of actual salary which is very common or laid off auto workers who stay home and still make $75 an hour of tax payer money. My vote is the unionized auto worker.
They had to know and are just pulling the wool over America's eyes - which is their modus operandi!
AIG should have realized this was going to be a PR disaster when they offered bonuses for people to stay on.
Wonder if Obama’s teleprompter will ever have to answer this question in a press conference?
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