Is It Really Fair That This Country Bails Out CEO's But Not The Rest Of America?

The failed CEO's of Citi, Countrywide, Bear Stearns and Merrill Lynch all walked away from sinking ships with tens and hundreds of dollars. It was all built upon bad business that eventually humbled or completely ruined their respective companies. The US taxpayers have been forced to cover their billions in corporate losses but besides a few embarrassing sessions in front of Congress, they're all just fine. As Nouriel Roubini has said, it's a system of "privatized profits and socialized losses." None of those former CEOs feel an ounce of pain for the economic ruin that is taking down the US economy and eventually the world economy. They are sitting on a gold mine that never should have happened. Even without the gamble, they all could have lived a comfortable retirement but now they are living beyond our wildest dreams.

When is Congress going to step in and re-visit this situation? Forget about blowing hot air for the TV, legal action is necessary. Why should they be able to walk away so easily and pain free? Don't even give me the old "they had a contract" nonsense because lots of contracts exist and plenty of them are revisited in court. The extraordinary acts of nationalizations, bailouts, debt purchases, etc have put us into new ground. Failing to take action will be a failure on behalf of the American public. Surely Congress will bring some accountability to this once in a lifetime event, no? Much like 9/11 when nobody was ever held responsible, I get the feeling we're looking at the same here. What does this say about us as a country that we so easily dismiss such obvious failures?

My sentiments, as well. Anyone that does not see the meltdown we are headed for worldwide, has their head in the sand (but they probably have their hands on their wallets ... ha ha ha).

More from Bill Moyers:

From our offices in Manhattan, we look out on the tall, gleaming skyscrapers that are cathedrals of wealth and power – the Olympus ruled by the gods of finance, the temples of the mighty, the holy of holies, whose priests guard the sacred texts of salvation – the ones containing the secrets of subprime lending and derivatives as mysterious and elusive as the Grail itself.

This last couple of weeks, ordinary mortals below could almost hear the ripcords of golden parachutes being pulled as the divinities on high prepared for soft, safe landings -- all this while tossing their workers like sacrificial lambs into the purgatory of unemployment.

During the last five years of his tenure as CEO of now-bankrupt Lehman Brothers, Richard Fuld’s total take was $354 million. John Thain, the current chairman of Merrill Lynch, taken over this week by Bank of America, has been on the job for just nine months. He pocketed a $15 million signing bonus. His predecessor, Stan O’Neal, retired with a package valued at $161 million, after the company reported an eight billion dollar loss in a single quarter. And remember Bear Stearns Chairman James Cayne? After the company collapsed earlier this year and was up for sale at bargain basement prices, he sold his stake for more than $60 million.

Daniel Mudd and Richard Syron, the former heads of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – aka the gods who failed – are fighting to keep severance packages of close to $24 million combined – on top of the millions in salary each earned last year while slaughtering the golden calf. As it is written in the Gospel According to Me, when the going gets tough, the tough get going.