rewarding failure

BofA figurehead Brian Moynihan earned--if one can use that verb--the worst-performing CEO title from Fortune:

Michael Mayo, a bank analyst at Credit Agricole Securities, recently ranked current bank CEOs by the relative performance of their shares during the time since they took over the banks. Moynihan became the CEO of B of A in early 2010. Since that time the bank's shares have fallen 42%. That puts Moynihan at the bottom of the heap.

Although Moynihan took $3 million pay cut, he still hauled down $7 million for 2011. "Based on the company's stock market performance," notes Fortune, "you might wonder if even that payout is too high." HuffPo commented during last week's BofA shareholders' meeting that "Today was a very good day for Brian Moynihan, the Bank of America CEO whose 2011 compensation package was just approved:"

As they were preparing to formally approve his lavish remuneration, I stood outside in a line of shareholders with a letter naming me the official representative for an investor who owns 82,000 BofA shares. Around me were about forty investors, each of whom was about to contribute in some small way to Mr. Moynihan's payday. But our little band of investors were haughtily dismissed by bank executives after waiting, some for hours, in the wilting Carolina heat.

The protesters chanted in the street as a PR executive told us we would not be admitted into the meeting -- and then asked us to get off the bank's property.

All around us, in what officials acknowledged was a dry run for the Democratic Convention, city authorities had given everyone's constitutional rights the day off by declaring the protest an "extraordinary event."

Also noted is the disparity in rights, where "bank execs continued to enjoy their full constitutional protections despite working for an institution with the worst rap sheet in town. The rest of us were guilty until proven innocent:"

Bank of America has profited greatly from taxpayer largesse. Yet, despite the billions of dollars it's paid out for illegal behavior, no one employed by the bank has been charged with any crime. Attorney General Eric Holder has yet to explain how it's possible for billions of dollars worth of crimes to commit themselves.