Some may be calling for Treasury secretary Tim Geithner's head, but in an interview with 60 Minutes that will air on Sunday night, Obama says he'll stand by his man—in fact, he'll fight for him. In excerpts CBS released early, Obama jokes that, if Geithner attempted to jump ship, he'd tell him, "Sorry, buddy, you've still got your job." Obama noted that he'll need to win over Wall Street to make his new toxic asset buy back program work, but remained critical of their controversial bonus practices. He also fired back at former VP Dick Cheney, who recently criticized the new president's plan to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay and to stop torture once and for all. "How many terrorists have actually been brought to justice under the philosophy that is being promoted by Vice President Cheney?" Obama asked. "It hasn't made us safer. What it has been is a great advertisement for anti-American sentiment."

The 40 activists aboard Connecticut's AIG protest tour bus on Saturday were vastly outnumbered by the photographers and reporters assigned to follow the first organized populist uprising aimed at AIG executives' homes and families. The Associated Press reports that photographers from as far away as Germany tailed the small band of outraged citizens, organized by non-profit Connecticut Working Families. Dubbed "Lifestyles of the Rich and Infamous," the tour was equal parts pitchfork mob and real estate voyeurism, featuring both outrage and wonder: At executive James Hass' sprawling Fairfield manse, one protester -- a gardener by trade -- mused, "Lord, I wonder what it's like to live in a house that size." Other protesters noted that many of their far humbler homes are on the verge of foreclosure. In anticipation of the protest, security guards stood sentry at executives' home, but there were no arrests or reports of violence.

Hold the olive branch: The Associated Press reports that Iran’s supreme leader, the Ayatollah Khamenei, has rejected the overture that President Obama made by video to the Iranian people this week. "They chant the slogan of change but no change is seen in practice. We haven't seen any change," Khamenei said in a speech before a crowd that chanted “death to America.” "They say we have stretched a hand toward Iran. ... If a hand is stretched covered with a velvet glove but it is cast iron inside, that makes no sense," Khamenei said.

Move over, Andrew Cuomo: The Connecticut attorney general is getting into the “shame AIG” game. Richard Blumenthal is asking the company why documents turned over late yesterday show it paid $53 million more in bonuses than it originally reported. The new total is $218 million, not $165 million, said Blumenthal, who said bonuses were “showered like confetti” on AIG employees. “The initial number was so outrageous that it will further fuel the justified anger and revulsion that people feel,” Blumenthal told AP. Connecticut is among 19 states demanding that AIG disclose details of the bonuses, and ordinary citizens are piling on: A busload of protesters is buzzing executives’ homes today to deliver letters from recession victims.

A post-partum MIA recently took to her blog to dispute reports related to her newborn son's name: MY BABY IS NOT CALLED ICKITT, PICKIT OR LICKIT THANK YOU VERY MUCH. But now TMZ says they've got the real name, and have the birth certificate to back it up: Ikhyd Edgar Arular Bronfman. The Oscar-winning electro-pop artist, whose real name is Mathangi Maya Arulpragasam, will also take over Amy Winehouse's slot in April's Coachella music festival, the LA Times reports. Winehouse dropped out of the much-watched festival early this month. This will be MIA's third Coachella appearance. Though MIA announced her retirement in June, she may actually be having her most active year yet, with an Oscar win, a harrowing 9-month-pregnant Grammy performance, and a series of production projects and work on her record label. The LA Times also reports that busy woman may also be working on a new album.

Out, out, toxic assets! The federal government has a new tripartite plan for eliminating bad investments from the financial system, which it will unveil on Monday, The Wall Street Journal reports. The new plan will require the US to buy up bad assets, and will require significant cooperation from the private sector. The effort, which WSJ estimates will cost some $75 to $100 billion, will create an FDIC-backed entity for buying and holding loans. But given the contentious relationships between the Obama administration and the companies it keep bailing out some questions how cooperative corporations will be with the White House’s new plan. The same CEOs who kowtowed before Congress mere months ago are no openly complaining about the government; Bank of America chief Kenneth Lewis criticized the Feds harshly in an open letter to employees on Friday.

Remember a few weeks ago, when the markets tanked after the rollout of Tim Geithner’s plan to save the economy? Well, his rescue has now leaked in detail, and it’s “an awful mess,” writes Paul Krugman. “The Obama administration is now completely wedded to the idea that there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the financial system.” Geithner is planning to create funds “in which private investors put in a small amount of their own money, and in return get large, non-recourse loans from the taxpayer, with which to buy bad—I mean misunderstood—assets,” the Nobel winner writes. But instead of leading to fair prices, they’ll have skewed incentives—with the taxpayer taking on all the risk. The almost certain failure of Geithner’s plan, writes Krugman, will doom any future solution to an early death in Congress.

On the heels of yesterday's nutrition-oriented garden planting ceremony, First Lady Michelle Obama opened up to The New York Times on food, body issues, and her family. As for clothes, Michelle says Barack "doesn't understand fashion," and sometimes hassles her about buying new clothes. "It's like, Why don't you mind your own business?" Michelle joked. "Solve world hunger. Get out of my closet." The first lady said she is not naturally thin and has to exercise and watch what she eats. Pleated skirts hide troublesome hips, she said, and mother Marian Robinson's nightly dinner taught her the value of a balanced diet. Michelle's favorite indulgence? French fries, her "favorite food in the whole wide world."

Can we all just calm down a little? That’s what New York Times Joe Nocera is asking. The AIG bonuses were infuriating, but the death threats, Cuomo’s outing of the bonus recipients, Liddy’s awful congressional hearing, and the House’s 90 percent tax on the payments did nothing to help fix the problem. Meanwhile, AIG’s real culprits, like ex-financial products head Joseph Cassano, “are counting their money in ‘retirement,’ Nocera writes, and Merrill Lynch staffers are holding onto their billions in bonuses. Even worse, the political response may be making the crisis worse: “The Obama administration appears to have lost its grip on Congress, while the Treasury Department always seems caught off guard by bad news,” he writes. Now that the taxpayers own AIG, what the government should do is position it as “ a company with many profitable units, worth potentially billions, and one bad unit that needs to be unwound.” The “economic arson” must be stopped!

Might President Obama’s plans disappear into a hole they open up? The Congressional Budget Office is projecting that Obama’s plans will create a deficit $2.3 trillion larger than the president projected for the next decade. The difference is a reflection of the administration’s more optimistic projections of economic growth. Anticipating the report, Obama reiterated his plans to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term and emphasized the “massive deficit we inherited.” “What we will not cut are investments that will lead to real growth and real prosperity,” he said.

George Hedges was a successful Hollywood litigator at a high-profile firm representing Mel Gibson and the Presley estate. But “not unlike a certain mild-mannered cinematic professor given to the occasional jaunt,” The Wall Street Journal’s Stephen Miller writes, Hedges “also had a passion for archaeology.” On one expedition, he helped uncover Ubar, a storied city lost beneath the sands of Oman around the early sixth century A.D. Funding for the undertaking was secured by Hedges through sponsors Mountain Dew and Kit Kat, “which proved very popular among the tribesmen of the Arabian Desert,” Miller writes. But Hedges was proudest of a successful two-decade pro bono campaign he waged to overturn the death sentence of murder convict Adam Miranda.

Celebrities turned out to say goodbye to Natasha Richardson yesterday at a service on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. According to the New York Post, “Among the 40 to 50 mourners paying their respects at The American Irish Historical Society on Fifth Avenue were Hollywood stars Lauren Bacall, Ralph Fiennes, Matthew Modine and Uma Thurman, ABC's Diane Sawyer and designer Kenneth Cole.” The Post also reports that Richardson’s mother, Vanessa Redgrave, sang “Edelweiss” to her daughter after taking her off life support and will go ahead with plans to act in an April 27 special performance of Joan Didion’s The Year of Magical Thinking, which is about, in part, a mother’s mourning of her dying daughter.

News may never come out of North Korea, but it sometimes disappears into it: North Korea confirmed today that it has detained two American journalists, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, on charges of “illegally intruding” into the country through the Chinese border. Yesterday, Washington confirmed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is working to procure their release. The two Current TV reporters crossed the river border while trying to get closer shots of North Korea.

Can’t a banker get some peace and quiet these days? Financial executives are lashing out at the 90-percent bonus tax passed by the House this week. Talking to the Financial Times, one banker really ratcheted up the anger: “It’s like a McCarthy witch-hunt...This is the most profoundly anti- American thing I’ve ever seen.” In a memo, Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit said “The work we have all done to try to stabilize the financial system and to get this economy moving again would be significantly set back if we lose our talented people because Congress imposes a special tax on financial services employees.” Politicians fear banks may react by returning public capital, even if it worsens the credit squeeze, and by refusing to participate in public-private partnerships to repair the credit markets.

Maybe Sarah Palin can use some of the stimulus money to bail out herself? The Anchorage Daily News reports that the Alaska Governor “owes more than a half million dollars to an Anchorage law firm that has defended her against ethics complaints, and she may create a legal fund to pay the bill.” Palin has dismissed the complaints against her, including Troopergate. "I must defend against these baseless ethics accusations out of my own pocket as the use of public monies to do so could itself violate state law," she said in a complaint of her own.

A pesky side effect of spending your embezzled billions on mansions in the toniest places in the world: The paparazzi already know your neighborhood. Shortly after husband Bernie lost an appeal to temporarily leave jail, Ruth Madoff stepped out of the Upper East Side apartment she is attempting to save from the Feds for a little night shopping. Wool cap on her head and grocery list in hand, Ruth plucked American and Jarlsberg cheese from the racks at her local Food Emporium before expressing frustration with her photojournalistic entourage and storming out. "Oh, this is crazy, forget this!" she exclaimed, according to Page Six. She then switched tactics, to sarcasm: "Oh, very exciting, I went to the grocery store." With her $93 million in assets currently falling under Federal scrutiny, Ruth is unlikely to fly under the radar in any foreseeable future. Before this, Ruth's last known shopping trip was to a corner deli for cigars and the New York Post.

Mike Tyson’s star faded long ago, which means that he’s now the perfect subject for a documentary film. Well, wish granted! The boxer is the subject of a new documentary by James Toback called Tyson, and he sits down for a long and fascinating interview with The Guardian. "When I watched it alone,” Tyson says, “I realized why people had certain opinions about me. When I was upset, I got upset like everybody else, but I'm an extremist, so when I got upset, I took it to the next level. I took it to the level of being almost violently upset. And I realize, if I was sitting next to that guy, he'd make me nervous. That guy was impulsive. Unpredictable."

Here’s your daily dose of counterintuition: “[Humanitarian] Aid is an unmitigated political, economic and humanitarian disaster.” Writing for The Wall Street Journal, Dambisa Moyo writes “Giving alms to Africa remains one of the biggest ideas of our time …Yet evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that aid to Africa has made the poor poorer, and the growth slower. The insidious aid culture has left African countries more debt-laden, more inflation-prone, more vulnerable to the vagaries of the currency markets and more unattractive to higher-quality investment. It's increased the risk of civil conflict and unrest (the fact that over 60% of sub-Saharan Africa's population is under the age of 24 with few economic prospects is a cause for worry).” Per-capita income is lower in Africa today than it was in the 1970s and the number of Afircans living on less than a dollar a day—more than half the continent—has almost doubled in the past two decades.

Two months ago Newsweek reported that 20 young Somali-American men in Minneapolis may have been recruited for jihad missions in Somalia. Now, the Minneapolis Star Tribunes reports, one of the alleged would-be-jihadis is back stateside, blindsiding Minnesota's divided, "traumatized" Somali community. According to a spokesman from Minnesota's Somali Justice Advocacy Center, the 22-year-old and his family fear for their safety and are in hiding. He is in talks with the FBI, who won't comment on the "ongoing investigation," but is not in federal custody. The community spokesperson wouldn't specify the man's motivation for traveling to Somalia, or how he paid for the trip, but implied that the man had a change of heart: "His expectation was not what he wanted when he went over there. ... I think he simply didn't like what he saw."