The Bailout Vote and the Tyranny of Representative Democracy

Since you have bought into this flimsy bill of goods crafted by the corporate Democrats, you'll buy anything. In addition to the above bridge, I have 2 or 3 middle-eastern wars to sell you too. Its all for a good cause, you know, and I can sure use the money.

We are heading for depression, no way around it. This was true before all the hullaballo in the last few weeks, and will still be true in the coming months. Many rational economists have been predicting it for years. To exist as a debtor nation and a debt & borrow economy is ultimatley unsustainable. Adding so much addtional debt will not soften nor shorten the depression. If the money were going to infrastructure projects, or mass transit, clean energy, healthcare or education it might actually lessen the coming depression, much as the New Deal did. Unfortunatley, Pelosi and your Saint Obama (who can do no wrong apparantly) are no Roosevelts.

I am heartened to see most of the other comments already here in vocal disagreement with you. You are no fifth columnist. I have for several years read your blogs, usually agreeing, but on this one you have crossed the line. You are wrong, and very wrong. I think you know you are wrong too, just as all the timid members of our congress were cowed into voting for war,and knew in their hearts it was wrong, you have given into the fear and hysteria.

Bush and his allies have resigned themselves to an Obama victory this year. They are doing everything they can to make it a phyrric victory for him. The deeper they can make the coming depression, the worse it will reflect on his abilty to cope with it. The more Deomocrats in congress in the comng years, the easier it will be to blame them later. What happens? Republicans sweep in to every office in 4 years and ensure their "permanent majority". I fear, though I hope I am wrong, that Obama has taken their bait. Maybe he's clever enough to work us out of it once he is President. Only time will tell.

If we're all in bread lines in a year, so be it. I'm about a month away from being in one myself. I just want the CEOs and Wall Street crooks to be in line with me, not escaping the depression in golden parachutes.

Better to let this ship sink. The sooner it does, and the less money we spend (and borrow) trying to save it, the sooner we can get to work on building a new ship. A better ship. Not a Titanic, but a Phoenix.

As the markets around the world clearly demonstrated today, the hurry-up offense of the Bush administration is entirely a fabricated situation. There is no need to believe those liars.

So who to hear on this bill? It is extremely rare for me to agree with the ultra-conservative Republicans who blocked the bailoout, but I agree with some of their proposals in principle if not in fact. I was hoping to hear more about them, but MSNBC cut off this caucus as they were getting into their details today.

The propaganda didn't stop there. CNN had on some "experts" (including one of their own reporters) who insisted that if people "truly understood" what was in this bill, we wouldn't have opposed it so strenuously.

I didn't bother with FOX, but everywhere else I tuned, similar "opinions" were expressed. It's clear that the full-court media manipulation press is on and the propaganda machine is expected to carry the day and persuade We, the People to allow rescue the fat cats of Wall Street with our pensions and 401Ks.

But to get back to the rebel Republicans, I hope that they find a way to get their ideas out into the mainstream where the rest of us can peruse them. If after thorough examination they prove worthy of support (as my brief initial impression suggests), then we should insist of our "representatives" that these points be included in the final bill.

Who will trust any plan, good or bad, right, wrong, left or center?

Who?

No trust is deserved. However, the responsibility is not the president's, not Congress', not Wall Street's.

The responsibility is ours, the people's. We deserve what we allow.

Now that trust and responsibility are dead, what hope is there that it won't all come crashing down?

Fine.

Go lemmings, go.

This bailout is a lifeboat for the rich. It has nothing to do with “main street”. Fact is it about stealing from America to save the rich greedy Wall Street bankers and foreign investors before what will be an unavoidable and very deep recession. Forty years of government, corporations and individuals living far over their heads encouraged by what is referred to by Biblical scholars as "Usury" is at the heart of the crisis. The only possible outcome will be a deep correction and devaluation of the dollar. This bailout plan is simply a lifeboat for the rich to cash out while most Americans get stuck with a lead weight around their neck. Our government has doubled its debt in the last 8 years. Now they want to recklessly tack on another couple trillion dollars. Truthfully....is the tightening of credit markets which will occur by refusing to pass this plan, such a bad thing if it results in a more responsible culture and savings. Tonight it appeared that the moneyed elite of CNBC and the “usurers” (who are the root of this entire mess) are in frenzy because of the Congressional refusal to fund their bailout of greed and incompetence.

hey, PM... sorry to leave you alone...really liked your style and thoughts... No bail out... We really need a revolution... fuck the consequences... some of all have only chains to loose... give'em hell...

"For what?" "Revolution." "Based on?" "Economic collapse + perpetual war + global warming = opportunity." "But how?" "Same way we stopped their Wall Street bailout." "And then what sort of world?" "It'll be up to us."

Even doing nothing is better than a trillion dollar golden parachute. But we can do much better than nothing.

Trickle-down economics has failed spectacularly and repeatedly. The Billionaire Bailout Bill is a gigantically cancerous version of trickle-down economics.

The New Deal and the WPA got us out of the last depression. Grow-up projects have also been used by other countries. Grow-up projects are much more beneficial than trickle-down economics.

The solution starts with bringing our troops home and closing 90% of our overseas military bases. Our military needs to be sized to defend us, not for maximum profiteering. The money thus saved can be invested in the grow-up economy - highways, bridges, levees, broadband, and universal single-payer health-care. The resulting economic gains will ultimately allow us to pay down the debt.

To avoid future bubbles we need four things - strict regulation of Wall Street gamblers, criminal prosecution of fraudulent derivatives valuers, civil recovery of the proceeds of fraud, and a mechanism to prevent corporations that are "too big to fail". The latter is simply accomplished by a progressive annual wealth tax on any corporate assets (not offset by liabilities) exceeding one billion times the minimum hourly wage.

But most importantly, we need to bring American jobs home. We can do this by changing the tax code to encourage investment in America rather than Mexico and China.

It's hard for bribed politicians, but for honest Americans the solution is simple. Rather than being trickled on, we just need to grow up.

For the pleasure of pwn'ing some Corporatist scumbags (same as the Right brought us to this for the pleasure of pwn'ing Liberals!), you would flush this country down the toilet....

Though from your incessant Obama-hating and Nader-pimping, I should have known you don't give a fig for anything but Tearing Down The Establishment, and don't care who or what you destroy along the way.

If the bailout bill was so Gawdawful BAD, tell me what would be good by your standards - or do you have anything at all that isn't just "Stickit2daMan!"...?

Hey, P.M.

That taste of burnt almonds in the Grape Kool-Aid? That was the cyanide! What was it that made your mind snap and you become a member of the dim, dumb and deluded. How absolutely pathetic.

I have often in the past viewed your articles as examples of perspicuity,perspicacity and erudition. Based on this piece which in my opinion is one of the most fatuous bits of vacuity on this subject, my opinion has dropped like the Dow and Nasdaq on 9/29/08

The Skeptical Cynic doth spake!

Santa knows when you are sleeping,
He knows when you're awake.
He knows if you've been bad or good.
Unfortunately, so does Bush,
Cheney, Rice, Mukasey, and...
the FBI, ONI, ASA, MCIA, CIA,
NSA, DIA, MI6, MOSSAD...

Pelosi is such a puke. She has done NOTHING constructive --neither economically nor constitutionally-- for working folk.

Neocon Nancy's priorities have historically been protecting Bush/Cheney from impeachment, protecting criminal corporations from justice, and repeatedly pushing through the hundreds of billions of dollars for war profiteers that she pretends to oppose. Pelosi's latest project is a trillion dollar cushion for the elite to ride through the recession on the backs of America's grandchildren.

The Billionaire Bailout Bill has more loopholes than my gardening sweater.

The elite don't have to repay the loan from our grandchildren. All that is required is that some future president propose a repayment mechanism. It will never be enacted.

The limit on executive compensation isn't.   It simply makes excessive executive compensation non-deductible. But elite corporations don't pay tax anyway and this won't change anything but a couple of bookkeeping entries.

The limit on golden parachutes isn't.   It's a small tax - less than the income tax paid by honest working Americans - and it only applies to lump sums, not "deferred compensation". And it only applies to future CEO's, not the CEO's who actually gambled and lost.

There is no regulation of Wall Street gambling. The elite will be able to continue shooting craps with a new pile of a million million-dollar chips donated by our grandchildren. Think what just one of those chips could do if invested in local schools rather than gambling parasites. As before, the elite still get to keep their winnings and working Americans cover their losses.

There are no prosecutions. No fines. That's all water under the bridge. We must look forward not backward. I mean, it's not like these people stole a loaf of bread to feed their children. They stole peoples homes and savings and pensions. Wholesale. They stole millions of peoples' American Dreams. Some corporations are too big to fail and apparently some criminals are too generous with their campaign donations to prosecute.

The only real question then, is why is P.M. Carpenter blogging here in defense of Bush/Cheney and Neocon Nancy and the Wall Street elite? There are plenty of places for wingnuts to hang out and regurgitate their propaganda points. Why does Buzzflash allow itself to be polluted with this stuff?

This Bail-out was a scam and mega-ripoff plan from Day 1. Demanding that we give Goldman Sachsman Paulson carte blanche with a literally unfathomable amount of taxpayer money to redistribute to his thieving bankster friends with NO oversight and NO accountability -- and top it all off by hiring and PAYING some of the same unscrupulous individuals who caused the mess to begin with to manage the government's new "assets," -- well, thank heavens the framers of this so-called bill (all 3 pages of it) were stupid enough to be so blatant about their evil intent that it finally got people angry enough to start clamoring for action from their representatives. Sorry to ramble, but that's how angry I am at the mere idea. Sure, the mess has to be fixed, but the last thing we need is to have the usual den of thieves in charge of the rescue plan. There are plenty of reputable economists around with no history of collusion with Wall Street who can weigh in on this problem and come up with possible solutions. But to trust this bunch not to rip us off again? No way! Renard

I was trying to find a link to the voting record and _every_ site I found kept taking me here in half an hour of looking: "To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide earnings assistance and tax relief to members of the uniformed services, volunteer firefighters, and Peace Corps volunteers, and for other purposes" http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2008/roll674.xml At 205/228 from yesterday I guess it _must_be_ the bailout vote. But, honest to God, the weaselly rat bastards don't have the balls to call it anything but a bill to relieve our soldiers, firefighters, the Peace Corps "and other purposes"? That's the ticket. They're bailing out Wall Street to save the whales, baby seals and "for the children". What slimy, cowardly rat BASTARDS. Don't believe me? Google the URL yourself and see if you can make better sense of it.

Of course the people are ignorant. They are also greedy, scared, insecure and angry all the time. That's no accident. That's marketing.

I am lucky enough be an X pat living in Scotland. WHEW!! We haven't got much to brag about but at least I'm not in the land of dumb and dumber. Once a movie title, NOW a reality. I saw it coming with the onslaught of R Rayguns and BOY was I right. And the walls . . . Davy Jones

Mr. Carpenter, I usually agree with your perspective, but not this time. First, I think our Congressional leaders were right to call the bill a bailout because that's exactly what it is. I've had enough of 1984-speak, of calling foul things by fair names to disguise their foulness. And though I understand that the economic fate of Main Street is connected to Wall Street, I think shielding people from the consequences of their folly is morally and ethically wrong. The fat cats acted foolishly when they played fast and loose with everyone else's money; the lean cats acted foolishly when they voted against their own economic interests and elected leaders who deregulated the financial system. The bailout bill casts the federal government in the role of an enabler, whose only function is to reward the bad behavior of both groups. The overwhelming opposition of Main Street to the bailout bill is an encouraging sign that the majority of Americans may have begun to regain their moral compass. Moreover, I think the bailout bill was far too hastily drafted to be supportable. From the time Henry Paulson demanded $700 billion to throw at the problem, no one considered any other alternatives. Our representatives tacked provisions on to Paulson's original request, but these provisions did not make the request an any less obscene effort to socialize the losses that Wall Street greed and disregard for sound economic practice had incurred. The Democrats and Republicans who voted against the bailout bill were right. That many are up for re-election in their districts does not make their actions any less right, for they were chosen to represent the people's will, not the will of Henry Paulson. Finally, I distrust and resent the scare tactics the Administration is using to sell the bill to the American people: Your job is at stake! Your kid's college loan is at stake! Your pension is at stake! The next thing you'll see on the floor of the stock exchange will be a mushroom cloud! We repeatedly fell for this kind of emotional blackmail after 9/11 (fool me once, twice, three times . . . ), and our current profound skepticism is long overdue.

#1. PM, as a gal caller to the Ed Schultz radio show said yesterday, her congressman, a Neanderthal Republican thug (in the Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe model) voted FOR the bailout... and Dennis Kucinich, who we all admire as the bravest and most honest member of Congress voted AGAINST the bailout... so, she happily told a distraught Ed, she was happy - if Kucinich voted against it - that the PELOSI-PAULSON BAILOUT BILL FAILED.

This was an ESTABLISHMENT vs "small-d" democracy bill, plain and simple.

#2. Yesterdy I watched Nancy Pelosi, the nominal "leader" of the Democratic Party (at least until the Dem. presidential candidate was decided), spend ten full minutes - twice, three times as much time as the other Representatives were allowed - blasting President Bush, the Bush administration, and the Republican Party, for bringing America's economy to the brink of the abyss, if not total ruin.

The clueless Pelosi then turned on a dime to her own Congress-men & women, and instructed them to....

...GIVE a SEVEN-HUNDRED-BILLION DOLLAR __BLANK CHECK__, at taxpayer expense, to BUSH's OWN Secretary of Treasury, with only the flimsiest, most ephemeral of strings attached to that BLANK CHECK !!!!

That would be SecTreasury Hank Paulson, a guy who amassed $432 MILLION dollars in Goldman Sachs stock in his 15 years there, the last seven years as G-S's chief.
A guy who was in the THICK of Wall Street's aggressively pushed, exaggerated, bloated, hyped portfolios, and "SECURITIZED" and "DERIVATIVE" Enron style market securities flim-flam!

Come On, PM, Pelosi is as much of a DISASTER for America, as Paulson, Bush, Cheney, Grover Norquist, Karl Rove, James Inhofe, Tom DeLay, Antonin Scalia, Trent Lott, and Newtie-pie Gingrich (et al, ad naseum).

Indeed, the only reason the American public and American voters don't DESPISE the above Republicans as the SNIDELY WHIPLASH cartoon villains who destroyed the American economy (today's market levels are where they were - before Bush took office!) is because Speaker Pelosi has taken not only impeachment "Off the table" - but therefore EVEN THE MILDEST, most cursory OVERSIGHT and Democratic PUSH-BACK. We effectively have only a RUDIMENTARY "opposition party" -
the FOXES are IN THE HEN HOUSE, the THIEVES are in the guard shack, the LOOTERS are IN THE BANK VAULT!

Henry Waxman writes up a dozen reports "there were some foul doings here" - and Speaker Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, Harry Reid, Jay Rockefeller, Dianne Feinstein (et al) all JOIN the Republicans and corporate media in tossing a big, wet blanket on Waxman's findings! At Least Joe Lieberman has the conviction to Give Bush and McCain a hug & kisses with his stab-Democratic-voters-in-back treachery!

And NOW Pelosi WANTS TO HAND that very, insanely corrupt Bush administration.... a ONE TRILLION DOLLAR CASH GIFT, at workin' stiff taxpayer expense, moments (hopefully 2 months) before Bush & Cheney walk out the door?

SPEAKER PELOSI, ARE YOU DAFT ?

That 10 minute lecture you made to your fellow Democrats yesterday, about how Bush-Republcian policies are killing the American economy, YOU SHOULD MAKE TO THE PRESS CORPS EVERY damn DAY! But like Sarah Palin, you are long on rah-rah, SHORT ON SPECIFICS. YOU, Speaker Pelosi, CAN NOT COMMUNICATE to the American public THE GREAT DAMAGE the Bush administration has done to America - unless you are moments away from handing those very bums ANOTHER TRILLION DOLLARS of taxpayer money, DEBT that, applied to America's exisiting $11 TRILLION credit card, would mean that taxpayers would pay twice to THREE TIMES AS MUCH before that credit card is actually paid off!

Unfortunately, there is not another Congressman/woman in Congress who would do much better than Pelosi in the Speaker's chair. Most of the others have had the fire-in-their-belly beat out of them a long time ago by the corporate media and Democrat "leadership" over these last appalling 8 years of BushCo, and Dennis Kucinich is just too honest and too straightforward to appeal to much of "What's the Matter with Kansas?" America. (Sarah Palin's America.) (Although if Kucinich had an HONEST media, he would be far more popular nationwide than he is.)

Well, there you have it. The PELOSI BLANCK CHECK was a FREE GIFT, a GET OUT OF JAIL FREE pass for the VERY lame duck Bush administration.

Pelosi's CLUELESSNESS (giving her the benefit of the doubt that she is not ABJECTLY CORRUPT), is exactly why her DISMAL 9% 110th Congress APPROVAL RATINGS are WORSE than Bush's, the Republican Party's, or even Dick Cheneys approval ratings!