Banks 3, America 0

The Washington Post reports today that banks receiving federal investments (bailouts) are on pace to distribute more than half of that money to their shareholders in the form of dividends over the next three years.

We have already seen that the bailout funds are not increasing lending (which was the whole point). It has also been reported that some banks will use the money to fund acquisitions of other banks (which could be beneficial if the purchased bank was in trouble, but not necessarily). So now we find that the Government made no restrictions on dividend payments, which bags the questions of what the fuck did these people in Washington do with my money?

$3.4 billion was invested in Fifth Third Bank, a corporation so poorly run that it deserves to go out of business. I should know, since my company banked with them for five years and I witnessed first hand how the place decayed after Old Kent sold out to Fifth Third. Never mind that it also has the dumbest name in the business.

If we are going to bail out the banks, we must have a say in how they operate. We are right back in the game of privatizing gains and socializing losses and I really can't believe how the Bush Administration has fucked us yet again.