Liberals and Republicans United on Bailout Bill?

House Narrowly Defeats Bailout Legislation
President Bush Had Urged Quick Approval
By Paul Kane and Lori Montgomery
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, September 29, 2008; 2:23 PM

In a narrow vote, the House today rejected the most sweeping government intervention into the nation's financial markets since the Great Depression, refusing to grant the Treasury Department the power to purchase up to $700 billion in the troubled assets that are at the heart of the U.S. financial crisis.


The 228-205 vote amounted to a stinging rebuke to the Bush administration and Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr., and was sure to sow massive anxiety in world markets. Just 11 days ago, Paulson urged congressional leaders to urgently approve the bailout. He warned that inaction would lead to a seizure of credit markets and a virtual halt to the lending that allows Americans to acquire mortgages and other types of loans.

As it became apparent that the measure was heading to defeat, stock markets took a steep dive. The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 700 points but then rebounded a bit. By 2:20 p.m. the Dow was down 455 points, about 4 percent. The Standard & Poor's 500 stock index was down 5.4 percent and the Nasdaq was off 6 percent.

Leaders met strong resistance from a liberal wing that opposed bailing out Wall Street's corporate executives and a conservative wing that denounced the measure as an abandonment of free-market principles.

Arguing that the country was on a "slippery slope toward socialism," Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) urged his colleagues to oppose the bill because of the "unintended consequences" to come. "If we lose our ability to fail, we will soon lose our ability to succeed. If we bail out risky behavior, we will soon see even riskier behavior," said Hensarling, the leader of a conservative caucus.

"It's not sustainable and we know it won't solve the underlying problem," said Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), likening the proposal to the Bush administration's "surge" of troops into the Iraq war last year.

Many lawmakers cast the vote as the equivalent of a war resolution or a presidential impeachment. Their speeches invoked 19th-century Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky and King Henry.

The House vote had been regarded as the most risky, because restive Republicans balked at the emerging proposal last week at a White House summit with Bush and the presidential candidates, Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.). And Democrats warned that dozens of their members, hailing from poor and liberal districts, would never endorse such a bailout.
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While it is true that something has to be done, this is not the answer. The rules Bush and McCain put into place made sure this kind of thing would happen when they took away with regulations and rules to insure it would not. They just didn't care what would happen. The truth is, they never seem to think about what comes with what they want.

They didn't think about the troops when they pushed to invade Iraq either. Set aside your thoughts on what has been done in Iraq for a second and open your eyes on a fact that is consistently ignored.

They knew there was no need to rush to invade Iraq. This is no longer being disputed. Did they wait until they had everything in place for the sake of those they would send to do it? No. They took no regard for the troops in Afghanistan. They had no regard for the wounded two military campaigns would bring. In 2005, there were less doctors and nurses working for the VA than there were working after the Gulf War. No one in Washington seemed to have been doing anything about it. Plans were not made for them to return home or to be taken care of back home.

When they made the decision to remove the regulations on corporate activities was made, they didn't think about what would come either. Bush now just expected to borrow his way out of the mess after the rich got richer, greed took control and they went off on their merry way leaving behind a wreckage for the American people. Now they expect the American people who have suffered for all of what they did bail them out because they thought they could scare the daylights out of us? I don't think so. No one can cause us to be even more fearful than we have been all these years because of their actions. The only difference now is that their rich powerful friends are in trouble and now they pay attention to them. Much like the contractors they favored above the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. kc