I don’t care that it wasn’t your department that caused the crisis.
I don’t care that you’ve worked your tail off and need some time off.
I don’t care that the trip was probably booked well in advance.
I don’t care that coordinating schedules for a revised trip anytime in the near future would be damn near impossible.
What I care about is that nobody at AIG had the foresight to see the political fallout from a $440k trip to the St. Regis, or if they did, that no one had the stones to stand up and say, “This doesn’t pass the smell test, we can’t do this right now.”
I get sales peoples’ mindsets. I understand the risks of canceling a trip like this. This isn’t a question of what these sales superstars deserved or not.
This is about the narrow-minded, ignorant mindset that apparently still prevails there. It’s about the fact that AIG lacks a leader who could stand up and say, “Not now, folks. The American people did their part, now we’ve got to do ours. The timing stinks, but it is what it is.”
It’s about the fact that like a cockroach, this little boondoggle is a signal of a deeper problem, that much of the $700 billion package is going to go to graft. Hell, it couldn’t even pass without an additional $120 billion in pork.
Remember post-Katrina spending SNAFUs? Trailers in mud holes, needed supplies going to thrift? Or the reports about waste at the then-newly funded Dept of Homeland Security?
Get ready, folks, we ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
AIG leadership character test: FAIL
Congressional character test: FAIL
Americans’ patience with this baloney: FAIL
{ 1 trackback }
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
One addition:
Americans’ first chance to change this baloney: Nov. 4
This is what the past 8 years has wrought: A new American demographic — tone deaf, 18-64. Don’t ask US or anyone ELSE to make sacrifices. Don’t change your life after 9/11: “Go shopping!”