You have to read it twice to believe it. Just when I thought I couldn't be shocked anymore by corporate greed another outrageous example comes to the surface. When you read Maureen Dowd's Tuesday's column in The New York Times, "I Ponied Up for Sheryl Crow?", it takes your breath way at the stupidity and outrageousness of how one corporation is responding to our economic crisis.

Here are some excerpts from this incredible column, but please take time to read the entire piece:

The entertainment Web site TMZ broke the story Tuesday that Northern Trust of Chicago, which got $1.5 billion in bailout money and then laid off 450 workers, flew hundreds of clients and employees to Los Angeles last week and treated them to four days of posh hotel rooms, salmon and filet mignon dinners, music concerts, a PGA golf tournament at the Riviera Country Club with Mercedes shuttle rides and Tiffany swag bags.

Unfortunately, it gets worse as the column continues:

Northern No Trust had a lavish dinner at the Ritz Carlton on Wednesday with a concert by Chicago (at a $100,000 fee); rented a private hangar at the Santa Monica Airport on Thursday for another big dinner with a gig by Earth, Wind & Fire, and closed down the House of Blues on Sunset Strip on Saturday (at a cost of $50,000) for a dinner and serenade by Sheryl Crow."

Let's be very clear, in essence, you and I paid for this junket and grievous excess. It is our tax dollars that are supposed to going to ending the economic crisis and helping people save their homes. Let's only hope that Vice President Joe "Go Get Them" Biden soon gives the folks at Northern Trust of Chicago a call real soon.