Bailing Out The Bailout

**Terri** · #1 09-25-2008, 09:30 AM

By Debra Saunders
September 25, 2008

Until Wednesday afternoon, when GOP presidential nominee John McCain announced that he was heading to Washington to work with congressional leaders and the Bush administration to craft a better bailout bill, both McCain and Democratic candidate Barack Obama clearly had believed that the last place they wanted to be seen was in Washington.

More specifically, the last place McCain and Obama wanted to be seen was in the Senate, where they work. You see, the Senate, according to the latest CNN/Opinion Research poll, enjoys (if that's the word) a 22 percent approval rating, 78 percent disapproval. (The numbers for President Bush, by contrast, are 31/68 approval/disapproval.)

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Centurion LIV · #2 09-25-2008, 10:29 AM

The market will right itself. Congress did not establish the market. Congress should not meddle in it now.

Most of the American taxpayers do not want this to take place. I sure as Hades don't.

Yes, the process will be painful for some for a while, maybe a long while; but to saddle the American taxpayer with a $700,000,000,000 debt (look at that number), to save the arses of Wall Street fatcats and people who should never have been buying houses in the first place is highly irresponsible. It was their own greed that got them where they are and they deserve to go down with it.

If Wall street has to crash to correct the corruption, irresponsible buying and irresponsible loaning then let it crash and burn.

And why are the Democrats in such a hurry to get the Republicans on board of this thing? Could it be that they want to have them to "share" the blame when its revealed to be the disaster that it is? A disaster it will be even with a 700,000,000,000 bailout. It may be o.k. for a few years but will surface again calling for an even bigger bailout. When it does really crash in a few years, the Democrats want to point to the Republicans and say "They did it too."

Vote the incumbents out and we might be all right.

Here's a joke:

Obama, McCain, Schumer, Pelosi, Reed, Frank, Kennedy, as well as most of the fools are on a sinking ship.

There are no lifeboats and no lifebelts available.

Who is going to be saved?

Scroll Down

The American People!

RamingtonStall · #3 09-25-2008, 10:35 AM

As long as we are bailing out the Banks and Fannie and Freddie and the illegal immigrants who got their mortgage money, etc., etc. I would like to to throw in an extra Trillion Dollars to bail out Social Security.

In any case I don't want to ever hear these Washington Elites telling me why they cannot "afford" to send me my Social Security Check in the future.

RamS

Centurion LIV · #4 09-25-2008, 10:40 AM

The market will right itself. Congress did not establish the market. Congress should not meddle in it now.

Most of the American taxpayers do not want this to take place. I sure as Hades don't.

Yes, the process will be painful for some for a while, maybe a long while; but to saddle the American taxpayer with a $700,000,000,000 debt (look at that number), to save the arses of Wall Street fatcats and people who should never have been buying houses in the first place is highly irresponsible. It was their own greed that got them where they are and they deserve to go down with it.

If Wall street has to crash to correct the corruption, irresponsible buying and irresponsible loaning then let it crash and burn.

And why are the Democrats in such a hurry to get the Republicans on board of this thing? Could it be that they want to have them to "share" the blame when its revealed to be the disaster that it is? A disaster it will be even with a 700,000,000,000 bailout. It may be o.k. for a few years but will surface again calling for an even bigger bailout. When it does really crash in a few years, the Democrats want to point to the Republicans and say "They did it too."

Vote the incumbents out and we might be all right.

Here's a joke:

Obama, McCain, Schumer, Pelosi, Reed, Frank, Kennedy, as well as most of the fools are on a sinking ship.

There are no lifeboats and no lifebelts available.

Who is going to be saved?

Scroll Down

The American People!

NewRepublicans · #5 09-25-2008, 10:51 AM

When Wall Street gets fixed so does Main Street at the same time. We do not need to bail out over-debted households but buying real estate at dimes on the dollar is not a bad way to bail out Wall Street. Wall street gets the bad debt off their book and can to begin to loan money again. With that the system freezes.

HOWEVER, I believe some top CFOs need to go to jail and top CEOs for any bailed out company should GET ZERO BONUS beyond their salarly ... and NO GOLDEN PARACHUTES INTO RETIREMENT. Not one dime beyond their salary!!

If they get rewarded for dumping bad paper onto the taxpayer then I say NO DEAL!!

Once again the taxpayer will get the $hit end of the stick but at least there is a real house attached to each piece of bad paper.

No way should the Govt buy out bad credit card debt. That is total irresponsibility on the lender and the credit card holder. That debt is unsecured and will be a total loss to the tax payer.

Dingbat36 · #6 09-25-2008, 11:34 AM

If I hear one more Demonrat whining and moaning about the Poor, poor people who are losing their homes,........I am going to "lose it"!

Wonder if this pity includes the people in Texas who took out a huge amount of mortgages (in total 43 million bucks worth) to flip existing houses? When the market started going south they simply walked away. Those people were developers, real estate investors; as I suspect many more than we realize (yet) were.

Then, of course, there are the illegals who also took mortgages they couldn't understand and certainly couldn't normally qualify for. Those people have no regard for any of our laws or they wouldn't be here at all. They can easily walk away and be no worse off than they were before they got involved with this mess. After all, they still have our overly generous social welfare system to "milk".

Finally there are our lower income Americans who would never have had a hope of owning a home had it not been for the foolish pandering Congress during the Clinton administration which insisted that Fannie and Freddie lower their standards to include them, using the Justice Department as their "bully" to intimidate the leaders of those entities. Neither of those entities are private sector businesses and have been further used (and abused) by the unscrupulous in Washington as their own private "piggy banks". When the President suggested oversight of Fannie and Freddie 4 years ago Barney Frank and Christopher Dodd were front and center to declare...why would you want that, there's nothing to be worried about there. Both of them should be out on their respected backsides as should many more in Congress.

Now, we are expected to bail out the banks, Fannie & Freddie, and AIG. Even now, as there are serious attempts by some in Washington to find a solution, there are those who would load even this legislation with pork! If they try to include the mortgage holders of these defunct loans, there is going to be a howl from the public the likes of which they have never heard before!

72yearsyoung · #7 09-25-2008, 11:42 AM

It's time for an ACCOUNTABILITY check.
1- in the 'private sector' !
2- In Congress - Senate and House !
3- voting records of all members of Congress !
4- the FBI investigations
5- STRICT overviews of bonuses to CEO's and CFO's !
6- attach and recover Bonuses of those who contributed to the mess !
7- investigate and charge those who are responsible - with fines and legal actions, including the opportunity for them to go to jail.

Many warnings have been given since April-May of 2001 (it traces back to the 1970's, to clinton's and demo-bats). Hang them from on high, with no excuses !!!!

America will be alright - if we have less democrats, socialism, communism, Marzism, and career politicans lining their pockets.

the ole man

notoObama · #8 09-25-2008, 11:57 AM

Anyone with any common sense at all can see that Obama ONLY does what he feels will be politically expedient for HIM.
Since he has been non-existent in Washington since he got there, why would he want to be there to actually attempt to do the job he was hired to do?
Obama is for Obama and his underworld buddies and if it isn't going to put money or power in his pocket, it isn't worth his time.
His comments that "IF he could be any help in Washington, he would go" speaks volumns of his attitude that it is 'BENEATH' his pay-grade to do the job he was elected to do.

thomas · #9 09-25-2008, 12:03 PM

"Once again, McCain put the job of good governance ahead of pursuing his presidential campaign. Only after Bush asked Obama to come to Washington did Obama relent"
I am pig biting mad at President Bush for extending that invitation. Obama's failure to respond to this national emergency actually earning his tidy salary spotlighted his sham senatorial status showing what an irrelevant, pompous, conceited ass he is, his senate seat only a springboard for his presidential bid. The invitation served as a "reality slap" up the side of his head, mitigating damage and concealing his true motives.
The Old Chief

TheShoe · #10 09-25-2008, 12:37 PM

upfront: I'm a total noobstick when it comes to politics and economics but this is something no one can avoid or dismiss with ignorance. So I am trying to remedy my ignorance by asking questions from people who seemingly have a better grasp on these topics than I do.

1. These banks, Fanny, AIG, and Freddie; they are all corporate entities, correct (rhetorical)?
2. ...then why in the hell don't we let economic darwinism prevail and let them sink or swim like the rest of the corporations out there?

So THEY made bad investments, THEY mad bad judgments and WE have to suffer for their mistakes AGAIN!!! didn't the banksgo through something similar (smaller scale) back in the late 80's hence these ridiculous ATM fees? (maybe it was earlier than that, I don't recall).

I am just so confused as to why the gov't has to bail them out and I'm sure there's a level of complexity in that answer that will take me a bit to understand.