Another part of the AIG scandal has come to light. Will we deal with what happened, or let the situation keep developing drip by drip?

The current administration has failed to tackle the worst unemployment situation in the US since the Great Depression, with Obama often sounding like Herbert Hoover on economics.

Amid reports that the official unemployment rate has gone over 10% (and underemployment to 17.5%) President Obama dithered. His response: call a jobs summit in December.

Now that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner isn’t going to impose pay restrictions on bailed out Wall Street executives, it’s critical to remember that severe economic inequality was a major factor in the financial meltdown.

I think we have to look at the public stimulus, and the bank bailout separately. And, when I say bank bailout, I’m referring to $12 trillion worth of loans, federal reserve facilities, extra credit lines to the FDIC to keep up, and everything else (I have an excel spreadsheet of the breakdown I’m putting in the book if anyone wants to see it)The public stimulus is too small, the bank bailout is too large, plus the financial system is not really being reined in, despite all the talk of regulatory reform. so, I don’t see it getting better any time soon. I see it getting much worse.

For anyone interested, I thought it might be fun to list his nicknames. Back in the early days of FDL, threads were filled with references to Darth Vader, pumpkinhead, tweety, Noron, old60grit, Church Lady, Mrs. Greenspan, xerox Ben, lemonhead, DeadEye, Mister Elizabeth Taylor [...].

This week, there were a lot of reactions to Tim Geithner’s new bailout plan, including commentary from David Corn at Mother Jones, Ezra Klein at The American Prospect and Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo. The Weekly Audit also highlights a couple of pieces on much-needed structural reforms to the U.S. corporate landscape by David Moberg of In These Times and David Korten at Yes!

In this week’s Audit, we highlight the effects of progressive media’s demands for economic justice on policymakers and social awareness, with a particular focus on the AIG bonus scandal.

These are not retention bonuses–this is protection money.

The Upside of Business Regulation.