"Outrage" That "Exploited" AT&T CEO Got Only $75 Million on retirement - Former GOP Senator

[pancha]

Can't make this stuff up, folks:

Phil Gramm, a former three-term Republican senator from Texas who once ran the Senate Banking Committee, told the House Financial Services Committee yesterday that “it was an outrage” that his friend Edward Whitacre, the CEO of AT&T, only got “$75 million” when he retired in 2007.

“If there’s ever been an exploited worker” it was Whitacre, said Gramm.

[Stargazer99]

1. Oh, the poor baby! I think all of them get too damn much and we the people are start correcting this

[mercuryblues]

2. Maybe he should

set him p a gofundme page. FFS. Remember this was at a time when hundreds of thousands of families lost jobs, homes, everything.

[KatyMan]

3. how about "first one with their

back against the wall" instead?

[hifiguy]

28. Worked with the Ceaucescus.

More than good enough for this SHPOS.

[lpbk2713]

4. How many workers had to be laid off and exploited?

... in order to give that scumbag $75 Mill.

[Octafish]

5. Phil Gramm?

The modern day Meyer Lansky of the War Party, that Phil Gramm?

Phil Gramm's now vice chairman of Swiss bank UBS where he works in "Wealth Management" with Bill Clinton, that Phil Gramm?

How were they to know that repealing Glass-Steagall would lead to trillions in losses for the US taxpayer? That Phil Gramm. That Bill Clinton.

[SoLeftIAmRight]

11. he is one of those people most responcible

for the crash of the American economy

[Octafish]

14. After helping plan (or letting happen) the crime, Gramm drove the getaway car.

UBS is an offshore tax haven trusted by millionaires and billionaires to manage their wealth.

Yet, for some reason, the DoJ can't get a conviction.

In a big setback to the IRS’s juggernaut against tax evasion and offshore accounts, a former top UBS banker has been acquitted of tax evasion. The U.S. charged Raoul Weil with conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government. The former exec was facing five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, and is the highest-ranking Swiss banker prosecuted in the U.S. crackdown. But now he gets to go home to Switzerland.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertwood/2014/11/03/top-ubs-banker-not-guilty-of-tax-evasion-big-blow-to-offshore-crackdown/

Which is weird, when considering the facts of the case.

[1norcal]

27. Thanks Octafish

Thanks again Octafish for your due diligence; I've come to rely on your input...

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

47. Yep...

... I wonder if he was held for questioning concerning his, "gardening after midnight", activities while in the Senate.

See post #19 below this post, "THAT", one was inserted into a bill after midnight, when all others in the Senate were in bed or otherwise occupied. They never even seen the insertion before voting on it hours later.

[appalachiablue]

50. +1. 'It's bigotry, bigotry against the successful! He was exploited, it's an outrage!'

~ Capitalism is the legitimate racket of the ruling class. ~ Al Capone

[staggerleem]

19. Let's not forget ...

... that Phil Gramm is also responsible for the Commodities Futures Modernization Act, which has led directly to the 17 TRILLION dollar market for derivatives, the very soul of today's "Casino Capitalist" economy. Wealth built on debt - yeah, that's what this country (and this world) need more of, right?

WRONG!

[Octafish]

22. Thank you for reminding me. Phil ''fixed'' that with his wife, Wendy Gramm, didn't he?

She also did wonders tying ENRON to BCCI.

[staggerleem]

79. Yeah - Wendy was an Enron Board member!

Pillow talk can be VERY influential. Just ask Clarence Thomas.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

58. Yep. And he was McCain's "financial advisor" during the 2008 campaign.

He called the people talking about the economy collapsing before our eyes "a bunch of whiners"

McCain played along with "all is well" - until he couldn't anymore. Then he suspended his campaign and flew back to Washington to "help fix" the crisis he denied existed just days before.

What a joke. A sick fucking joke, but still a joke.

[Dopers_Greed]

62. OMG

I totally fucking forgot about that

[staggerleem]

80. I fully believe that was the day that he lost the Presidency.

He was scheduled to appear on Letterman that night. He lied to Dave & said he had to jump on a plane & fly to DC to "fix this mess", but it turned out that his destination was really a mere 4 blocks from the Ed Sullivan Theater. He went to appear on Katie Couric's newscast - and Dave found out about it, and showed a live clip of Gramps in Katie's Green room after his monologue.

Then he DID go back to DC ... and in a week of meetings, in and out of committees, he spoke NOT ONE WORD! Oh, yeah, McCain knew how to "fix things" alright!

[erronis]

20. Surely not the Bill Clinton that is the husband of the annointed Hillary?

What a strange coincidence that so many honest and upright people share names with the folks that put the banking system (and the taxpayers) into the downward spiral.

[Octafish]

25. I heard it on Fox noise.

Via DU.

[Trailrider1951]

42. Yep, republicans love to point out that Bill Clinton SIGNED the bill repealing

Glass-Steagall, but conveniently forget who authored that bill. And they never call it by name: Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Gram-Leach-&oq=Gram-Leach-&aqs=chrome..69i57.7408j0j7&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8#q=gramm+leach+bliley+act+pdf

And let's not forget Gramm's lovely wife, Wendy.

http://nomadicpolitics.blogspot.com/2012/01/friends-of-rick-perry-mr-and-mrs-gramm_06.html

[Fortinbras Armstrong]

69. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers supported it, and talked Bill Clinton into signing it.

Larry Summers was simply wrong when he supported it. I personally know an economist who quit his job at the Treasury Department because he disagreed with Summers to his face on Gramm-Leach-Bliley. According to him, a couple of years ago, he ran into Summers and said "I fucking told you so!" And you cannot sneer at Clinton for following the advice of his Treasury Secretary.

The fact remains that Gramm-Leach-Bliley was a Republican plan, written by a Republican senator, and it was a dismal failure.

[4Q2u2]

61. S&L's

They new it would work so well because it worked great the last time they ran this scam
1. Have Dem President stupidly sign deregulation, so they can claim clean hands.
2. Wait for a Bush to be in the White House and steal whatever you can, they cry TOO BIG TOO FAIL.
3. Get bailed out and make money from the bail out.


You know that hands off maket setting kind of Capitalism.

[newthinking]

63. Holy shit! If that site does not illustrate the merger of corporation and State........

Once a president and their staff are finished they manage wealth for the elite. Amazing!

Not just Clinton and Gramm, but GW Bush and cabinet members.

There is a greed infection in modern democracy. We have spread this thinking throughout the world. Most every leader is looking to get rich. We bribe new leaders through this revolving door even in other countries to do the bidding of our elite. Then people are shocked when we learn how leaders could not wait for their millions and instead directly steal it.

[Raster]

68. Oh Octa, that's going to ruffle a few feathers!

Oh yeah, THAT fucking Phil Gramm. Butt-boy for anything with a BIG bank balance. There are NO WORDS, however, sell-out, scumbag and sociopath do come to mind. You know, the usual evil rethuglican trifecta.

[Hotler]

6. kicking n/t

[jalan48]

7. I've come to the conclusion these 1%ers seriously don't get it.

I think they are approaching Marie Antoinette level.

[tblue37]

32. Approaching? I see Marie in their rearview mirror eating their dust. KnR. nt

[jalan48]

34. LOL-Let them eat McDonalds!

[Pharaoh]

8. Talk about your sense of entitlement!

[Initech]

9. All I can say is....

[SoapBox]

10. And...

[Initech]

53. World's tiniest violin playing just for the AT&T CEO.

[Eric J in MN]

12. Ordinary people are lucky if the end of their jobs includes two-weeks notice. NT

NT

[neeksgeek]

13. "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

15. Not the Onion?

Geesh.

You're right. You really can't make this stuff up!

[lark]

16. I'm sure fucktard is totally OK that many of that guys ee retired with next to nothing.

They had to spend every dime they made on sheer survival.

God, how I hate these entitled rich assholes.

AT&T Chairman, having devalued his company greatly, should have retired with nothing as a result of the harm he brought the company during his tenure.

[timdog44]

17. Of course I am only a nurse

but I sense a lot of dementia here.
I wonder if he thinks he should get some of that $75,000,000

[erronis]

21. I'll take dementia if it puts $75M in my bank and a will to donate to good causes.

[Solly Mack]

18. Was he (Gramm) working on commission?

Fucker.

[Jean Genie]

23. Really?

Really? Getting seventy five million was an outrage? And yet so many of these "privileged people" whine and moan that a $15 per hour minimum wage is too high. I'm speechless; I despair for all of humanity.

[hifiguy]

24. They really are

BEGGING for the guillotines, aren't they?

It would be impolite to not oblige them.

[GoneFishin]

70. They really are. Talk about disconnected from the real world.

[mwooldri]

26. Where's the outrage for the rest of us, Mr. Gramm?

It's an outrage that a whole lot of us don't even get anywhere near close to $75 million USD on retiring from work.

The only way any of us would ever see a retirement income close to $75MM USD is if the USA had a bout of hyperinflation. I somehow don't see that in my future.

[ProfessorGAC]

31. Per An Article I Read Here At DU. . .

. . .2 or 3 weeks ago, that's something like 1000 times more than half the people over 50 have saved for retirement so far.

I don't remember the exact figures, but it was something like that. Half of everybody over 50 had $75,000 or less in savings for retirement.

So, half the working population over 50 has 0.1% or less, but this is an outrage to Gramm. I have that right, correct?

[DirkGently]

29. And he actually got double that, anyway.

Whitacre actually received a retirement package totaling $158 million.

Holy distorted reality fields, there Phil.

[truebrit71]

30. He said that with a straight face?

Fucking delusional...."exploited worker my arse!"

[Eric J in MN]

33. His retirement package includes "free health insurance for life" for himself and his family.

Also, using a "corporate jet for 10 hours a month and $25,000 to cover his country-club fees."

http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/27/news/newsmakers/att_whitacre/

[ctsnowman]

71. .

[MrScorpio]

35. Jeez, sounds like something straight outta the Onion. nt

[Dont call me Shirley]

36. Phil, you are delusional and delirious. We can no longer listen to these crazy-makers.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

37. I know a conservative that believes republicans are the ones that fight for the little guy....

I told him about this and he said "Republicans fight for Wall Street and Democrats fight for the banks."

He believes fighting for Wall Street is fighting for the little guy because, free market = freedom = anti-government = freedom = mom and apple pie = freedom.

[Vinca]

38. Poor man. How can he eke out an existence on a pittance like $75 million?

Sad. There goes the yacht and vacation homes #4 and #5.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

39. Not the Onion? Really? nt

[sulphurdunn]

40. Phil is one of many truly disgusting

pigs to serve as a republican senator who should be doing time in a federal pen. How is it that such a criminal swine is invited to run his whinny mouth at a congressional hearing?

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

48. My sentiments, exactly...

...

[The Wizard]

41. That's the same Phil Graham

Ph.D. in Economics who said Clinton's fiscal policies would cause a depression. Yeah right, I believe him.

[Demeter]

43. When every woman in America has been so "outraged", then we can rest

[olddots]

44. he dresses up like Thatcher on weekends

and watches Gone With The Wind .

[americannightmare]

45. Another conservative...

attempting to perfect their "newspeak"

[L0oniX]

46. OFFS ...cried in a river and it was still dry.

[dem in texas]

49. Phil Gramm is a scumbag

When he was in office, he would fight anything that helped Texas, then try to take credit for it when it was approved. He was in the pocket of the health care industry. He and his wife sat on the board on Inron while the company was being looted, but never spoke out. You can be sure that they got their got their fat checks for serving on the board. Worst US senator from Texas ever, never represented the Texas people, only represented banks, health care business and himself.

[PatrickforO]

51. LMAO

Listen, Phil, if there EVER were exploited workers, it's the people who work for maybe $14 per hour in ATT's phone centers, or maybe the people who work their asses off in the ATT retail outlets.

I mean, you've gotta be kidding me!!!!!

[Diremoon]

52. Never enough

I guess this answers the question of how much is too much. For them (the rich), there is no such thing as too much. When Gordon Gekko said " Greed is good" they took it as the meaning of their lives.

[silvershadow]

54. Phil Gramm is an outrage. nt

[Scuba]

55. K&R

[CBHagman]

56. And Gramm has been peddling that line for years!

During a search for video of the comments, I found this 2008 piece from Frank Rich.

[url]http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/opinion/20rich.html?pagewanted=print&_r=0[/url]

Mr. McCain’s fiscal ineptitude has received so little scrutiny in some press quarters that his chief economic adviser, the former Senator Phil Gramm of Texas, got a free pass until the moment he self-immolated on video by whining about “a nation of whiners.” The McCain-Gramm bond, dating back 15 years, is more scandalous than Mr. Obama’s connection with his pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Mr. McCain has been so dependent on Mr. Gramm for economic policy that he sent him to newspaper editorial board meetings, no doubt to correct the candidate’s numbers much as Joe Lieberman cleans up after his confusions of Sunni and Shia.

Just two weeks before publicly sharing his thoughts about America’s “mental recession,” Mr. Gramm laid out equally incendiary views in a Wall Street Journal profile that portrayed him as “almost certainly” the McCain choice for Treasury secretary. Mr. Gramm said that the former chief executive of AT&T, Ed Whitacre, was “probably the most exploited worker in American history” since he received only a $158 million pay package rather than the “billions” he deserved for his success in growing Southwestern Bell.

But no one in the news media seemed to notice Mr. Gramm’s naked expression of the mind-set he’d bring to a McCain White House. And few journalists have vetted the presumptive Treasury secretary’s post-Senate history as an executive at UBS. The stock of that banking giant has lost 70 percent of its value in a year after its reckless adventures in the subprime lending market. It’s now fending off federal investigation for helping the megarich avoid taxes.

Treasury secretary! Just imagine that one...

[bluedigger]

57. He needs to be checked for lead poisoning.

He's clearly delusional.

[moondust]

59. Beyond absurd.

Can't we give the poor predator a tax break or something to help ease his pain? Better yet, let's just write him a check on the U.S. Treasury for whatever he thinks he's worth. K?

So sad.

[NCjack]

60. If Edward spends $1M/year for the rest of his life, he will die very rich. nt

[awoke_in_2003]

64. I started working when I was 18

so, figure I will have 50 years of working. In all that time I probably will not have made 1/10th that. Fuck Whitacre and Gramm

[wolfie001]

65. What an jackass! nt

[valerief]

66. Is this a joke? Because the real outrage is the Gramm-Leach_Bliley Act that

repealed Glass-Steagall and made Wall St. an official casino.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm%E2%80%93Leach%E2%80%93Bliley_Act

[appalachiablue]

67. Phil Gramm- and he's serious!?!

[Exilednight]

72. I'd accept 1/100th of that as a pension and consider myself lucky.

[dobleremolque]

73. Graham also said in 2008 that

it was only a "mental recession", and that we had become a "nation of whiners." Well. Don't we have full citizenship in that nation, Phil? Whining about $75 or whining about $75 million is still whining.

[louis-t]

74. Fuck

both of them.

[marble falls]

75. But the service ATT gives doesn't outrage him? Phil Graham outrages me.

[polynomial]

78. Business and Political corruption

The genie is out of the bottle, these articles in DU expose the massive collection of crimes done by political hackers that are criminals, social terrorists, and rogue government officials, so called businessmen, Congressmen and Senators subverting legislation to profiteer all the while expanding risk and uncertainty to the American tax payer.

These DU articles must persist and reappear until the mainstream media with an honest passion starts to expose this failed part of America.

Maintaining silence is not going to make these events go way, it makes them worse, empowering bad actors to operate with impunity.

Rather than putting the political perpetrators head on a stick we need to use today’s technology to place the face of this political criminal corruption daily relentlessly on the news television screen.

To identify the real identity thieves who steal, especially those politicians secretly or without open force, ear mark, redact or amend legislation, or reports for profiteering, that is Bush Crime Inc.

AT&T paying million dollar pension to the CEO in cushy offices shows a nature of resilience of what Bush economics really is. Stiff the poor sole that works in the sewer cabling, or the mainframe testing and connecting telephones in difficult environments.

A few month ago I installed U-verse AT&T premier computer data line.

Get this, the new thing is no contract is signed, and the billing started to come in late, so I started to get late charges.

After or advertisement connection it seems it does not matter what the customer thinks you have to pay what they want.

Plus it will now cost me one hundred and eighty dollars to disconnect, some can argue that is the so called resilience.

Again thanks to Octafish for the article about the Bush Harriman connection.

There was a time of my own personal experience in Harriman’s Union Pacific railroad that I cannot let go and forget.

Many management officials in the Union Pacific Railroad used the basic safety program as a tool for retaliation and retribution to convolute injury reports. From my view a criminal action that needs to be addressed.

Currently waiting for the Department of Labor determination, if this determination is in my favor, I know it will have an effect to improve Health Care and Services and Recovery in the transportation industry throughout the nation.

[tartan2]

76. What planet does Phil Gramm come from?

ignorant SOB.

[Orrex]

77. Poor guy should have invested more in his 401K

I hope he's able to struggle by on that miserable 8-figure pittance.