The Dems MUST Write Their Own Bailout Bill -- FAST!

[snot]

I've been involved in debt "workouts" involving hundreds of millions of dollars -- pretty big borrowers persuading pretty big institutions to settle for cents on the dollar.

Hundreds of millions may be small potatoes cf'd to the current crisis. But in my experience, the bigger the money, the MORE accountability is demanded.

Lenders -- let alone equity investors -- LET ALONE DONORS, which is what this last bailout bill would have made us -- do NOT extend credit, invest, or GIVE money away, unless the people asking for the money OPEN their books and disclose exactly what their assets and liabilities are, what their finances looked like last year, what they plan to do with the money, etc.

Can you imagine a bankruptcy case in which the debtor asked his or her creditors to help cover his/her debts but refused to open his/her books or disclose what their liabilities were?

Ok, in any workout, you expect some spinning, jockying, etc., BUT NOTHING like the ultimatum now thrust at us: GIVE US YOUR MONEY OR YOU DIE!

But the proponents of this bill can't or won't even tell us where they got the number.

If this were really an emergency, or at least if they really cared about it, they would have presented something a reasonable lender/investor/donor might conceivably accept. They'd be able to tell us how they came up with $700 billion, and they certainly wouldn't have demanded absolute unaccountability.

Either it's not really an emergency, or they care more about the looting opportunity than about bailing out the economy.

EITHER WAY, IT'S IMPERATIVE THAT THE DEMS WRITE THEIR OWN BILL -- FAST.

Nature abhors a vacuum. Unless we've got Plan B ready, we'll be stuck with some version of Plan A.

To my mind, NO bailout should afford the kind of power and immunity to any member of the executive branch that even the "compromised" bailout bill would have done (given the virtually total lack of any meaningful enforcement even for Constitutional violations). E.g., a good precondition of any bailout would be to un-repeal Glass-Steagall, and extend it to cover new institutions.

Instead of saying, we need to pass a Repub piece of sh*t and maybe we can fix it later, let's restore something we know worked for 40 years, and if it needs fixing later, we'll consider it.

P.S.: I and many other U.S. citizens have worked through every holiday there is, more than once. PLEASE, someone who knows, tell me that Dem pols are in fact working on this now and during the next few days.

[Abaddon865]

1. Trickle down...sounds like someone's pissing on you

Thanks to the Bush Administration they have finally proven that the Reagan, may he continue to burn in hell, Policy of Trickle Down does not work. So let's try a new plan, instead of throwing money at Wall street and the rich bastards who got us into this mess, lets give this bailout to the people who really need it, the people at the bottom. Every American citizen over the age of 18 and making less than $250,000 a year gets $400,000 from the governemt to do with as they please. As we saw with the earlier bribe (Economic Stimulus Package) given to us by the government, that those who needed it spent it on the necesities:groceries, bills, home repair, and savings. WHile the final option might be a dangerous option to play with with more than $100,000 the rest would sure as hell stimulate the economy. The Governemnt of course will have to tax right off of the top, because we still have to have some "real money" to run this country.

[TxBlue]

2. fellow fdic'er

worked out a few also. this bailout=bullshit as the wallstreet protesters would say.

Totally agree with you. Everything $1mill+ had to have a multi-page legal case written up and approved by regional and dc levels.

3 Frigging pages the original Paulson bill was.

Give me A bREAK!!

It's highway robbery. How can people be so blind?

Granted economy needs help but trickle it up not down and it'll give immediate relief and not go down a rathole or end up
offshore in a tropical hideaway.

[JDPriestly]

3. Great post. I've worked Christmas Eve, Thanksgiving, no holiday is that important

if you have a job to do. I'm sure there is a lot of work going on behind the scenes.

Haste makes waste, and the Paulson proposal even amended was prepared far too hastily.

[ContinentalOp]

4. k&R

[girl gone mad]

5. Get a liberal coalition together with something ready to go.

Have Krugman et al endorse it.

[eridani]

6. They already have. Check out Bernie Sanders

OK, he's an Independent, but he votes with Dems most of the time.

[reggie the dog]

12. He generally does not vote with Dems when

the Dems are voting with the Republicans......

[TexasObserver]

7. I agree with the gist of your OP. Democrats need to start over from scratch.

We all know that whoever brings the money to a bailout calls the shots on EVERYTHING. They make the deal great for them, whether it is great for anyone else.

Our government must think like that. We should only run bailouts to save the interests of the general public, not to save someone's salary, someone's parachute, someone's authority. We need to fire en masse the top management of companies taken over.

I believe the time for a bailout is when the public clamors for it. When they do, we need a good bill ready to go, and it should be the first major legislation for the coming Obama administration. HE needs to make the bill his, and make it contain his requirements in details.

Each and every bailout should come before congress, and have to be proven necessary in open hearings.

[yowzayowzayowza]

8. Unless ya got 10 Repub Senators in yer pocket,

this is gunna have to be a bipartisan effort.

[snot]

10. So we bring a great proposal to the table; if less than 10 Repubs support it,

at least they bear the rap.

A big problem for the Dems is, they keep waiting for the Repubs to set the agenda. We need to make THEM respond to OUR agenda for a change.

[Festivito]

15. Yup, people are watching this time. /nt

[FatDave]

17. Yup.

If republicans block it, they're the assholes. If Bush vetoes it, it's his fault. We can say "we're trying, republicans won't let us pass it."

Why is this shit so hard for congressional democrats to figure out? Write the legislation you want, call out the pukes for not supporting it. Next congress you'll have a better chance of getting your legislation passed.

[Two Americas]

11. not true, not true

Not with the public rejecting a bailout by such large margins and expressing such strong resentment against Wall Street and corporate greed and corruption.

Republicans who opposed a strong Democratic relief plan would be committing political suicide.

Audacity is called for. Make the Republicans react for once. Put them on the defensive. Force them out onto the light of day and make them defend Reaganomics. If Democrats can not do that now, when would they ever do it?

Can we think in terms of playing political hardball? Ever? To save the party? To save the country?

For years I have heard party activists blame the "stupid" people - "when will they ever wake up?" Now the people are ready to reject Reaganomics, and would come back to the Democratic party by the millions.

Yet we are still hearing excuses and calls for caution and compromise.

[yowzayowzayowza]

13. Political exigencies are not ...

"excuses and calls for caution and compromise." Ignoring 'em izn't gunna be reported as 'audacious' or "hardball" rather more politics as usual. I certainly don't have a problem with a lil theatre for election advertising fodder, but they'll prolly do a good job of protecting their members running for re-election.

[Two Americas]

14. ok

How come Republicans ignore all of those "political exigencies" and prevail? How come they don't have to worry that their audacity and hardball politics will be seen as "just so much politics as usual or theater?"

I am going with the "excuses and calls for caution and compromise" theory.

It may depend, though, upon whether or not a person is committed to winning the consolation prize in politics, being right - as too many Democrats are - or to achieving actual real world objective results - as our opponents most definitely are.

[reggie the dog]

9. I know Sanders is an Independent

but he could pass for a Socialist here in France (along with Kucinich by the way, these two "crazy lefties" would be considered moderate lefties in most of the EU where parties like Labour, Social Democrats and Socialist exist) What about his plan? Congress could force that to W's desk on a straight party line vote so long as that other Independent McCain supporting former Democrat voted with the Democrats in the Senate.

[snot]

16. ok, have sinced learned IT WAS A 3-F'ING PAGE PROPOSAL

This is way beyond a total f*cking joke.

[magellan]

18. Exactly. If the Dems aren't willing to own the solution 100%

...then they shouldn't push one.

You realize, of course, that we're demanding they actually start acting like a MAJORITY....