A few weeks ago, the same federal government that once encouraged banks to consider unemployment benefits as income on mortgage loan applications did something even worse.

And we're not talking about playing subprime bingo with 700 billion tax dollars.

What the government did was purchase an insurance company called AIG.

Feds said they did it because AIG was about to go belly up.

Thousands of American businesses fail each year without so much as a sympathy card from the U.S. Treasury Department. But when AIG got shaky, Uncle Sam was there with a helping hand. Holding a sackful of cash. An estimated 85 billion taxpayer dollars, to be exact.

The feds said AIG was such a major player in the global financial world, it had to be saved. Then the feds said once AIG had regained its footing and started making money again, its new owners, We, The Taxed, would reap the rewards.

If that happens, it will be the first time government ownership has improved a business. Just ask Karl Marx. Or the Castro brothers.

Once my taxpayer status made me an official owner of AIG, I started watching my investment. So far, I don't like what I see.Things started to sour when I learned that just a few days after receiving the taxpayers' initial $85 billion "investment," AIG executives celebrated the good news by flying first class to California. Then they spent a half million taxpayer dollars playing golf, getting drunk and having spa treatments. It was eerily reminiscent of a congressional junket.

When taxpayers screamed bloody murder, AIG bigshots said, "Sorry, we won't do it again." And they didn't ... until the next $37 billion government check hit the mailbox.

This one got AIG "sportsmen" so excited, a few of them dashed off to England to hunt partridges. And not in a pear tree.The AIG gunners spent $86 thousand at a 17th-century English hunting lodge called Plumber Manor. The house specialty seems to be killing British partridges and screwing American taxpayers. There are no reports on how many quail were killed by AIG execs. We only know they were careful not to shoot the Golden Goose.

Meanwhile, millions of Americans are asking, "How dumb are these AIG guys, anyway?" We already knew they couldn't run a business. Now it's clear they can't even run a hunt.

When it comes to shooting partridges — or quail, as we call them Down Here — the AIG hunt coordinator should have been fired for not knowing the best quail hunting in the known universe is in south Georgia.

If the AIG guys were serious about a quail hunt, they should have called my cousin Raymond Morris in Ft. Gaines, Georgia. Raymond would have hunted their brains out for less than half the British ripoff rate, including a wild bird supper with all the trimmings. Plus, if the AIG guys wanted some fresh seafood, one of the world's finest all-you-can eat catfish places is right up the road.We can hope these recent embarrassments will be enough to shame AIG executives into curbing such expenditures in the future. But that's then. This is now. And when it comes to hunting, AIG execs might do well to remember that, right now, it's the American taxpayers who are ready to shoot a few birds.

(Send your e-mail comments to: alex@newnan.com)