If it's Citi's money being spent, then you have no right to criticize. And I know this'll blow your mind, but now that the bailout money has been signed over to Citi, all that money belongs to them, too, and can be used however they please. Unless there were any specific provisions in the deal restricting what Citi was to do with the money, they can use it however they like.
Don't like it? Tough cookies. Our right to control that money ended when we inked the deal with Citi.
Regardless, it's all a giant red herring. That $10 mil is a proverbial drop in the bucket. Citi has about $2 trillion in assets. That new office amounts to 0.0005% of what Citi holds. Citi could renovate dozens of offices that way without changing their situation materially.
I can't understand why people hold opinions like this. First off it's not Citi's money, ITS OURS. We gave it to them to rescue their company not for new rugs, and paintings. If I go to the bank and ask for a loan to open a buisness and then spend that money on new crap for my house isn't that fraud!? From my understanding Republicans hated the stimulus bill but sort of got brow beaten into signing it much like the PATRIOT Act, sign it or you unamerican well this time the line was sign it or you hate America and want to watch it go bankrupt. I cannot belive we actually gave billions of dollars to companies that
epically failed with almost no over sight! The stimulus bill was riddled with holes and now that the American taxpayer found out, politicians are looking for everyway to cover their butts, which pisses me off that they didnt do this BEFORE the bill was signed but jezze they need to do something. I dont belive the retention bonuses where in the best interest of the Country, maybe the best intrest for the company (AIG) but not for the country. So let me get this strait in terms of analogy, I work for a day trading corporation, I make a bunch of bad trades and end up losing more than my entire companies worth, but dont worry here comes Mr. BigGov to dole out money to us because we are a critical part of the countries financial system. My boss comes to me and tells me I'll be fired in the next 6 months, but if I can make back some of the money I lost he will give me 1 Million of the BigGov money.
And everyone's alright with this?!? I think since the Gov basically owns AIG now, (which is basically communism. I guess you republicans were right about Obama wanting to turn us into a Communist state, but guess what he couldn't have done it without your blessing!) part of the bill should have included that the Gov has retained the ability to renegotiate these retention bonuses. To the average american it just looks like these Execs are looting a sinking ship that the taxpayers are trying to save. I wonder what your feelings are over the 50k hunting trip AIG execs took, They worked hard so they deserve a company vacation paid for by American taxpayers. EDIT: After some digging apparently they have wasted over 526k of tax payer money.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27201970/Regarding $10mil as a "drop in the bucket" that is part of the irresponcible thinking that got us into that mess. Why dont you tell a homeless shelter, a charity, or a gov program that got its funding cut because of this bill that $10mil is nothing, im sure they would disagree with you. Or wait maybe the homeless people dont deserve it because they didnt earn it! The Citi bosses are rich so they deserve the best on the backs of Americans I guess. . . :|