Why the bailout bombed: GOP blames Pelosi, but message that mattered was from voters back home

[DeepModem Mom]

Fortune: Why the bailout bombed
Republicans might blame Pelosi's rhetoric, but the message that mattered was the one that came from voters back home.
By Nina Easton, Washington bureau chief
September 29, 2008

WASHINGTON (Fortune) -- Barely containing his temper, Virginia's Eric Cantor, deputy whip for the House Republicans, stepped to the microphone this afternoon to blame the bailout defeat on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's "failure to listen" and her charged partisan rhetoric in condemning President George Bush's "budgetary recklessness" and "anything-goes mentality."

If only it were that simple. If only the failure of the White House to muster enough votes from its own party to avert what it calls looming financial disaster could be blamed on a few ill-chosen words uttered on the House floor by San Francisco's hyper-partisan speaker.

In fact, Monday's surprise defeat of the $700 billion rescue package - meant to blunt a burgeoning financial crisis - can be traced to a failure on the part of the president and his treasury secretary, Henry Paulson, to fully appreciate the ferocity of the popular revolt they touched off nine days ago.

Republicans today voted against the measure by two to one. With only 60% of Democrats also voting in favor, the plan to have the government buy up hundreds of billions in assets, mostly mortgage-backed securities, went down to defeat.

The reality is that conservative House members were less interested in the ear-ache they got from Pelosi than the earful they've been getting from constituents. Calls to Congressional offices have been running overwhelmingly against the rescue - just five weeks before constituents go to the polls to vote on their members....

***

(T)here were many fence-sitters who, as of Monday morning, the White House had assumed were in its column. Pelosi may not have helped, but the plan died because Republicans weren't willing to ignore a revolt among the folks back home and cast a rushed vote on a massively complex subject with an almost unfathomable price tag....

http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/29/magazines/fortune/nobailout_easton.fortune/index.htm

[Stellabella]

1. "Ill chosen? Hyper-partisan?"

How about 'she spoke the truth', CNN.

What a bunch of right wing gasbags.

[Art_from_Ark]

6. Really

Nancy Pelosi is "hyperpartisan???"

What kind of weird ganga have the gang at CNN been smoking?

[dbt]

2. Democrats have also been getting an earful from constituents.

My pet DINO's office said calls and e-mails were overwhelmingly against the bailout, yet he voted for it.

Republics had the ultimate excuse: the overwhelming majority of taxpayers are against the bailout. The could have truly said that they were representing the will of the people back home, yet they chose to whine about Pelosi.

A pox on both houses.

:grr:

[roseBudd]

3. The GOP base is made up of know nothings who know not what a liquidity & credit crisis is

[SouthToTheLeft]

4. I'm not ...

... Sure if Pelosi helped, but I think the hysterics about this issue in the press sure haven't helped anything.

[ixion]

5. oops... spoke too soon... the problem really wasn't the voters

we all know pols don't really give a rat's ass what their constituents think.

No, the problem was that there weren't enough "goodies".

Now, with an xmas tree full of taxbreaks and free money give-a-ways, we'll they're lining up to vote.

Screw doing the right thing. It's about the perks and what you can do to make the lobbyists happy. :puke: