The effort to get to the bottom of those payments by AIG to its counter-parties is heating up.

Earlier this week, we noted that several different efforts to investigate that question. Now, reports the New York Times, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) has sent a letter, signed by 26 other House Democrats, to Neal Barofsky, the inspector general for the TARP funds, calling on him to probe the matter.

We first reported the existence of Cummings' effort over at TPMDC Wednesday.

In the letter, according to the Times, lawmakers asked Barofsky "to find out who had made the decision to shield A.I.G.'s trading partners from any losses during last fall's crisis, and what factors had shaped the decision."

How will Barofsky respond? It's not as if he doesn't already have a lot to do, trying to track what happened to all that money we gave the banks. (And his task probably isn't made easier by the fact that Treasury is refusing to say (sub. req.) how much bailout money is left.) But as we've said before, the issue of how Treasury made the decision to bail out AIG's counter-parties in full -- to the tune of over $49billion -- is pretty crucial.

We've asked Treasury for a response from Barofsky, and will keep you posted.