Well the bailout passed. I am very disappointed. It went from a $700B bailout package to a fat pork bacon $810B bailout package. The bill was signed today by President Bush and passed in Congress by 263 to 171 in the House. I hate this bailout. I cannot believe Congress turned down a bailout last week that didn’t have so much Pork Spending! Come on people!
I resigned myself to the bailout when I read about the previous bailout in 1980s Savings and Loan crisis. We ended up bailing out banks in the 1980s and 1990s with mortgage fraud. Funny, we learned nothing and no regulations. What was the point of the $160B bailout back then?
So I figured we were going to go through with it. But what the heck happened that the bill ended up fatter than a side of bacon? $110 in earmarks! Here at the Taxpayers for Common Sense gives the top 10 Sweetners.
- Wooden Arrows
- Motorsports
- Rum Excise tax
- Research tax
- Exxon Valdex litigation
- rural schools
- state and local taxes
- tv and film production tax
- wool products
- economic credit for american samoa
Geez. What is going on?
13 responses so far ↓
1 Jake // Oct 3, 2008 at 6:38 pm
The problem with this bailout is that it has no chance of solving anything - it only buys time. it’s an $800 Billion dollar bandaid that will try to keep inflated prices - inflated. Here’s a comment I left on another blog when the subject was brought up and people were afraid of keeping their money in the market.
“The intervention is only putting a small bandaid on a gapping would. The derivative market is what caused this - Buffet called them Financial Weapons of Mass Destruction - it’s a 1200 Trillion Dollar Market in a 600 Trillion Dollar world economy - the two do not fit together - we’re 600 Trillion short.
The $700 Billion infusion will not stop this - the only thing we can hope for is that it will buy us time to unwind and abolish derivatives; the likely hood of this happening is slim to none - too many Banks would be out of business.
Obama and Mccain receive the majority of their campaign dollars from the very banks that are carrying the most derivatives. JP Morgan has in excess of $90 Trillion on their books - more than 1.5x the worlds GDP!!
This is no reason to pull your money out of the market - if it crumbles then you’re dollars, yen, pounds, euros will be worthless anyhow - keeping your money in the market in solid companies that sell products globally will ward off inflation that is sure to grow rapidly in the coming years - if we do avoid or continue to prolong the crash of the worlds Economy”
I still have much to learn about this situation but from what I’ve read so far this $700 or $810 Billion has no chance at fixing this
2 Jake // Oct 3, 2008 at 6:47 pm
Can you edit that to say “gapping wound” gapping would doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
3 Mrs. Micah // Oct 3, 2008 at 6:50 pm
(I’d actually suggest “gaping”).
I was also really disappointed by all the pork. I don’t like the bailout package, but it seems horribly unAmerican for them to push their own interests on something which is supposed to be fixing a national emergency.
4 Jake // Oct 3, 2008 at 6:54 pm
Thanks Micah - that would be correct
5 LivingAlmostLarge // Oct 3, 2008 at 6:59 pm
http://www.moneyweb.co.za/mw/view/mw/en/page95?oid=228768&sn=Detail
Actually Jake Buffet says the problem is an economic pearl harbor and wants the Bailout Package. He thinks the bailout has taken too long.
He says we’re investing in undervalued stocks, the US government that is. Sigh.
And we’re spending $700b, but $110b on earmarks.
6 Jake // Oct 3, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Well my comment is filled with errors but my point remains. I’ll try to get an error free post up about it tonight or tomorrow.
7 chris // Oct 4, 2008 at 5:36 am
I knew this was serious when two things happened:
Bush looked sick, I mean seriously sick, when he was on tv a few weeks ago talking about Paulson’s bailout plan.
The New York Post at about the same time had this article that stated in part:
The market was 500 trades away from Armageddon on Thursday, traders inside two large custodial banks tell The Post.
Had the Treasury and Fed not quickly stepped into the fray that morning with a quick $105 billion injection of liquidity, the Dow could have collapsed to the 8,300-level - a 22 percent decline! - while the clang of the opening bell was still echoing around the cavernous exchange floor.
The bailout or rescue plan or whatever it should be called is really a Hail Mary pass to save the economy. That’s how desperate it is. The $800 billion ball has been thrown in the air. The question is now is there somebody near the end zone to catch it and run it in for a touch down? That is yet to be seen.
8 Kristy // Oct 5, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Yeah, I am not happy about the earmarks either. I do think the bailout was necessary though.
9 LAL // Oct 5, 2008 at 2:39 pm
I just don’t get why we added $110B in earmarks onto a bill that didn’t pass last week.
I’d be voting out all the jerks who switched their votes from last week to this week> They should have just take the less fat bailout! There is no excuse to have put on $110B in earmarks.
11 Tim // Oct 7, 2008 at 6:54 pm
yeah, there are goofy things in there and people will focus on goofy things rather than the good add ons; however, although i for one am glad about the amt relief and other provisions, i wish they weren’t included in the bailout bill.
12 LivingAlmostLarge // Oct 7, 2008 at 9:09 pm
I think we were better off the with previous bill. It had less add ons.
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