'This Week' Transcript: Bonuses, Bailouts and Budgets

Mar. 22, 2009 — -- ABC'S "THIS WEEK WITH GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS"

MARCH 22, 2009

SPEAKERS: GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS, HOST

JARED BERNSTEIN, CHIEF ECONOMIST TO VICE PRESIDENTBIDEN

SEN. KENT CONRAD, D-N.D.

SEN. SUSAN COLLINS, R-MAINE

REP. MIKE PENCE, R-IND.

[*] (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

STEPHANOPOULOS: Good morning, and welcome to "This Week."

Bonus anger boils over.

(UNKNOWN): Arrogance, incompetence and greed.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Washington responds.

(UNKNOWN): The people have said, "No." In fact, they've said,"Hell no."

(UNKNOWN): The only way to get their money back is to tax itback.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: They've got a bomb strapped to them.You don't want them to blow up.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Did AIG and the banks get what they deserve orhas Congress gone too far? What does the bonus battle mean forObama's budget, the treasury secretary, and his new bank plan?Questions for top players from the House, the Senate, and the WhiteHouse, our "This Week" debate.

Then, the president hits Leno's couch and ESPN, but should hehave stayed home? That and all the week's politics on our roundtablewith George Will, Donna Brazile, Robert Reich, and ABC's businesscorrespondent Betsy Stark.

And, as always, the Sunday funnies.

COLBERT: Let's go get AIG!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: From the heart of the nation's capital, "This Week"with ABC News chief Washington correspondent George Stephanopoulos,live from the Newseum on Pennsylvania Avenue.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Hello again.

Well, you can sum up Washington's agenda this week in just twowords: anger management. The key question: how to deal with therage unleashed by those AIG bonuses without undermining the broadereffort to fix our financial system.

To debate what's been done and what comes next, we're joined thismorning by Republican Senator Susan Collins, a key member of theSenate Appropriations Committee; Congressman Mike Pence, the chairmanof the House Republican Conference; from the White House, JaredBernstein, chief economist to Vice President Biden; and the chairmanof the Senate Budget Committee, Kent Conrad.

Welcome to all of you. And let's begin with those AIG bonuses.

Senator Conrad, the House passed a 90 percent excise tax on anyfirm that got more than $100 billion bonuses to any firms getting morethan $5 billion from the federal government. Will the Senate pass asimilar excise tax?

CONRAD: The simple answer is, "I don't know."

STEPHANOPOULOS: Will you vote for one?

CONRAD: I've got my doubts whether that's the best way to dothis. I think there are certain constitutional questions about theimposition of a tax on a limited group of people. But, look, I don'tthink there's any question we've got to try to do everything we can toget the bonuses back.

You know, if -- if I were in charge of AIG, I'd call in thesefolks and I'd say, "Look, you either give them back or you're fired."That we can do, because we own the company.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But the government doesn't yet have the ability-- the treasury secretary is seeking it -- to get the resolutionauthority. But right now, they say -- the White House says thegovernment doesn't have that ability.

CONRAD: I'll tell you who does have the ability, is the manwho's running AIG. He is in charge of the company. He could call inthose people and say, "Look, you either give it back or you're goingto be fired."

There's no way you can justify, when the federal government isputting up $170 billion to rescue that company, that folks who wereinvolved in creating this mess get $165 million in bonuses.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Senator Collins, your Maine colleague, SenatorSnowe, said she'd prefer to wipe out any bonuses to any financialinstitution receiving government money. Do you agree?

COLLINS: Well, first of all, all of us are angry that thishappened in the first place. And it could have been prevented. Itisn't just the head of AIG. The treasury secretary could have made asa condition of receiving the money a requirement that would haveprohibited these bonuses.

But as angry as I am, I agree with my colleague that we need tobe careful. And the problem with the Senate bill is it is so wide inits scope that it would apply to tens of thousands of employees allacross this country who had nothing to do with getting us in thismess.

STEPHANOPOULOS: That's the Senate excise tax proposal, which isonly a 35 percent tax, but it would apply to a far broader number ofcompanies.

COLLINS: Right.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So you're against both the House and the Senateexcise tax?

COLLINS: I'm not against getting the money back. In fact, Ifeel very strongly that we do need to recoup the money. I'm just notcertain that either the House-passed bill nor the Senate bill are thebest approach.

We need to look for an alternative means of recouping this moneythat doesn't cause further harm to our economy as we're trying to getbanks lending.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But is there one? Is there another means? Imean, that's the question.

COLLINS: Yes. As Kent Conrad said, I think there are otherapproaches. We can have the treasury secretary put more heat on AIG.He never should have allowed this to occur in the first place.

We can make sure that there is pressure for people to voluntarilyget the money back or else they're going to lose their jobs or there'sgoing to be no further funding for AIG.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Some of that has started to happen. You votedagainst the House excise tax, correct?

PENCE: I did, George. And, you know, I -- I opposed the WallStreet bailout from the beginning, like most House Republicans. Andthe truth is, House Republicans share the outrage of the Americanpeople over the idea that we would use taxpayer bailout money forexecutive bonuses.

But, you know, the real answer here, the real option I'll sharewith my two Senate colleagues, what we ought to say is to AIG, weought to say, "No more bailout money until AIG recovers all of themore than $200 million that's been distributed in executive bonuses."

What's the Democrats brought to the floor this week was really aconstitutionally questionable bill that was really nothing more than atransparent attempt to divert attention away from the fact that,because of Democrats in Congress and the administration, these bonuseswere able to be distributed to begin with.

There was language in the bill that was authored by the senatorfrom Oregon and Senator Snowe that would have prevented these bonusesfrom going forward. And that language was removed, we're told at --at the urging of the administration.

And I -- you know, this week's -- this week's effort was really a-- you know, it was a -- it was a disappointing spectacle, and it was-- it was mostly driven by the fact that Democrats are tryingdesperately to draw attention away from the fact that they made thesebonuses possible.