YOUR MONEY IS NONE OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS

Barry Ritholtz continues his uncharacteristic rage over what's happening right under our collective noses:

[W]hat was misleadingly described as systemic risk turned out to be in large part little more than a counter-party bailout — money for the very same people who helped cause the problem. Only the $25 billion figure I mentioned was off by 100% — the WSJ is reporting this morning it was $50 billion dollars, almost a third of $173 billion total AIG loot.

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Now you know why the Fed was so reluctant to reveal who the counterparties were.

This is a giant FUCK YOU to the American taxpayer. Isn’t there some Congressmen (besides Ron Paul) who are morally offended by the Paulson plan, which is slowly becoming the Geithner plan? Isn’t there anything that can be done?

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This is simply unconscionable . . .

This isn't some sort of marginal tinfoil hat thing. The smartest, best-informed (and honest) Wall St. experts are expressing nothing short of screaming, ranting, sputtering outrage over this.

Those who refuse to acknowledge what's happening in the clear light of day are insane. Truly insane, in that they deny reality in favor of their wishes.

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Update - Yves at Naked Capitalism also posts on this same topic. Good one, as usual. A highlight or two:

Bottom line: covert subsidies were given to bank via AIG. Remember, Henry Paulson, who had perilously few inhibitions about shoveling money at banks, even when the pretexts were often dubious and the checks non-existent, nevertheless was afraid to overpay openly for dud assets, which is why he retreated from his original conception of the TARP as as way to hoover up bad debt.

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Wake up and smell the coffee. The public purse is being looted and we the great unwashed are being fed pablum. Just because the perps work for once esteemed institutions and are typically treated with deference does not change the nature of the undertaking.