Making Sense Of The Financial Deal–Updated

September 26, 2008 / 10:46 am • By Dr. Melissa Clouthier

House Republicans “rebelled“, eh? Maybe it’s because their constituents are burning up the phone lines in all out mutiny. The Republicans have acted like Democrats “lite” for years now. I have a newsflash for the Republicans, including McCain, about this whole bill: It feels wrong to fiscal conservatives and taxpayers generally.

My most liberal of liberal friends gloated in a Facebook message that Bush will be ushering in socialism and add an economic failure to his military failure.

The problem in America is cultural: a bigger portion of the populace lives beyond their means than ever before. Too much stuff, too much house (that isn’t worth the money paid for it), too, too much.

The great thing about America is cultural: risk-taking, the ability to make mistakes and survive them, the opportunity to start again. Americans get a do-over if they make a mistake.

The question facing Congress and the President is this: Does Wall Street deserve a do-over? Does Congress deserve a do-over? Their stupid regulations forcing bankers to loosen credit when people who were very bad bets caused this problem. Why should Americans trust Congress with the solution? I think that’s where the do nothing sentiment comes from.

Will business start-ups be harmed by the contraction in credit? Yes. Will businesses fail? Yes. Will people lose jobs? Yes. Especially employees of small businesses.

It’s no wonder Congress has themselves tied up in knots. There are no guarantees no matter the choices. And there are great risks no matter how it’s handled.

The American patient is sick. Any intervention could potentially make it worse. Lack of intervention, could make it worse, too.

Updated:

The Anchoress says this (mind you, go to her page where she has TONS of links–I’m at a conference right now and blogging during a presentation so I don’t really have the time to give all this the attention it deserves, I will however, try to liveblog the debate):

EARLY RANT: (Scroll past this for latest updates) I need to first opine that the Democrats yesterday blew my mind with their last-minute addition of 56 billion to the bail-out, their sneaky, slippery attempt to play political games with some of this money – directing it to ACORN (!) – and their subsequent attempt to lie and to blame the GOP – the president – anyone but themselves for not passing a bill which the GOP CANNOT BLOCK. We already know that Nancy Pelosi has no leadership skills except in spite and obstruction – we see she is completely out of her depths here, but Barney Frank’s behavior last night, and his disrespect toward the GOP and the President was particularly egregious in a time of crisis. He behaved like a trapped animal trying to distract the hunters toward anyone but him. Meanwhile Chuck Schumer is unusually, uncharacteristically silent; Barack Obama – except when mentioned by a press pretending he is leading – seems irrelevant to the process and to have no genuine ideas or input, or a desire to lead. All he seems capable of doing is whining about the debate while Rome falls about his ankles. McCain is quite right that the debates would be less urgent if Obama had done the Town Halls McCain had asked for – debates Obama said he’d have “anytime, anywhere” before refusing all of them. I say at this point SCREW the moderated debates that tell us nothing and insist that these candidates town-hall it and speak DIRECTLY to the people who will be most affected by all of this – that would be the ordinary folk. And do the same for Biden and Palin if they debate.

The longer this goes on, the less people trust these dolts to take a wise course. Pelosi and Reid act like children bouncing around in one of those ball pits at McDonalds. Obama seems like a vestigial organ on a worthless appendage. Why should we trust these people to fix this problem?

And there is RAGE and I do not use this word carelessly about executive pay. And well there should be. It is outrageous to walk away from failure rich. But, and I’d like to add this, if we’re going to get all socialist about executive pay, lets take the money from all the losing basketball teams, too. What about those fat cat ball players. At least they have a skill. Actors in moronic movies that make no money should also not make a salary. How about that? So, while I think the compensation is vile, I’d like to point out that Tom Cruise makes at least $20 million a movie for essentially playing the same part over and over and over. Good grief, someone actually pays Charlie Sheen. So, life isn’t always “fair” and can’t be “made” to be fair, either.

Cross-posted at RightWingNews.com

Posted in America • Corrupted Culture • Political Animals
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  • Naqamel

    The current economic woes, with cause and responsibility: Watch this video.

    Summary: Carter, Clinton, Pelosi, Obama and the Democrats are to blame for this mess.

    Electing Obama to “fix” the economy is akin to letting the inmates at the asylum prescribe their own medicine.

  • Glynn W.

    ummmmm golly . . . do I really have to say this? You see, Tom Cruise does not make 20 million TAXPAYER dollars. He makes 20 million MOVIEGOER dollars.

    See the difference?

    Your socialist bailout of Bush’s economic catastrophe would make Castro proud.

    Go ahead, eight years of Bush’s ineptitude, and you would blame the Dems? Brought to you by the same folk who started a fool war with Iraq after being attacked by Afghanistan. . .

  • Phil

    You asked if Wall Street deserves a do-over. Do they ever give investers who lose their money in the market a do-over, or is that just the way things go for the hapless schmuck that made a bad investment decision? Wall Street can kiss my ass. The bailout is wrong simply on principle. The people that created this mess were benefitting greatly when everything was rolling along. They weren’t sharing that benefit with me. In fact, they got greedier. Now, it goes south for them, due to foreseen circumstances, NOT UNforeseen. And they want to share the negative results, penalties, consequences, whatever you want to call it, with you, me, and everybody else. No. They can deal with it. They can suffer, just like the rest of us plebs. See, these people have lost touch with the common person. They don’t know how to suffer, they’ve forgotten. And anything that looks like discomfort, or worse, outright loss and failure, well, that is cause for panic and a declaration of crisis, because it’s them. It looks to me like lower and middle class America is being EXPECTED to save the ultra rich from having to participate in the pain of this. They don’t want to have to give up an extravagant way of life, and buckle down and exist like so many others do. Tough shit, I say. It also occurs to me that many, if not all of the politicians that are in favor of the bailout measure stand to lose a lot of investment money themselves if it doesn’t go throuh. This seems like a huge conflict of interest to me. Has anybody said anything about that? I’ve read and listened to a lot of statements about the effect this bailout money is supposed to have. All I’ve heard and read is if, might, should, may, will hopefully, could…. That doesn’t sound the least bit promising to me, in fact, it sounds just the opposite, like monumental disaster. Greed precipitated this problem, and throwing a mountain of money into the mix is no way to contend with greed.

  • Pingback: Why is ACORN in The Bailout? | Right Voices

  • Trish

    A lot of honest working people are going to get crushed by this, no matter which way it goes. The taxpayers will have to pay, no matter which way it goes. At the moment it really is a choice of the lesser of two (or several) evils.

  • Dave

    I just read on the comcast homepage that a deal on the bailout was likely to go through. I actually had a queasy feeling in my stomach while reading it. First of all, this is being done “in the hopes of unlocking frozen credit” according to the article. In the hopes of? What happens if those hopes aren’t met? $700 billion flushed down the toilet of corruption, that’s what. Has anybody considered that this problem of defaulted mortgages is only the first wave of many? If the economy doesn’t take a fairly dramatic upward swing, it seems apparent that we will be faced with more of the same. Then what? $700 billion more? I think giving the money to the financial institutions that are largely responsible for creating this mess is foolish, shortsighted, and wrong. The article I read also indicated that there was a chance for taxpayers to share in the financial companies’ future profits. Really? How’s that supposed to work? Will the taxpayer ever see a dime of any money that may be recouped? Hell no. Just look at the way the Social Security surpluses have been handled if you have any illusions about the government’s stewardship of your money. And the notion of getting any sort of return is predicated on the assumption that these firms don’t go under first. Living on credit is not indefinitely sustainable. Sooner or later the fiddler will have to be paid, and the longer we put it off, the more expensive and painful it will be. This bailout is merely a postponement of the inevitable if we Americans don’t stop living a life of entitlement based on credit.

  • Earl Greco

    This bailout and how to solve it is over my head. Let me just say this I am 81 years old the youngest of nine, seven boys two girls.
    All seven of us inlisted in WW11.
    That said although i was only a child during the great deprestion i do remember this. We owned a house that we could not pay the mortgage which was owned by a lawyer.
    My mother went to the lawyer and made a deal to pay just the interest until my father could find a job.after some years we begain to pay principal and interest.What would happen if thoes that are unable to pay there mortgage had a one rear moratorium on the princible and just paid the interest.At least thease homes will not be vacant and no one will loose there home.Just a thought my mother did it with nine kids at a time when we had beens and bread as a daily diet.Just a tought.