Worse Than The Disease

NO!!!

Forget about the election. Forget about the war. Forget about it all, because by the time you vote in November, the stupidest thing the government’s done in a long, long time will already have gone down, and it’s gonna be too late.

SEVEN HUNDRED BILLION DOLLARS??? To do what? To save the butts of the guys who got us into this trouble to start with. So let me get this right: Secretary Paulson and the Fed chairman are saying that capitalism works… as long as there’s never any risk for the rich? Only opportunity to make bank, but never a chance to fall down and actually lose money. That would be unthinkable. No, no, little taxpayer, you’ve got it all wrong. Uncles Hank and Ben know what’s really going on. Your retirement is tied up in that failing bank, and it needs to be protected.

No, sorry guys, that’s not really what this is about. This is about unchecked, reckless expansion of executive authority. This is about giving the Treasury department a bigger budget than the Pentagon. This is about paying more than the equivalent of another Iraq war; but it’s not going to Our Boys on the front lines, it’s going to Vinnie the Banker, to Irresponble Ed the mortgage broker, who got in over their heads and need someone to save them from their own actions.

There are other ways to make this work. We don’t have to squander the taxpayers’ inheritance like this. Don’t let this happen, guys. The government and the market will be a new kind of broken, something that the world hasn’t seen since, oh, maybe the collapse of the Soviet Union. This is malfeasance.

Oh, didn’t you know? That’s a crime.

So maybe I get a little worked up about these things sometimes. Maybe I’m a little too doom and gloom. But doesn’t having the federal government buy Wall Street seem like a bad idea to anyone else? (Hey, if it’s for sale….)

Links

Alternative Proposals that Don’t Cost $700 Billion

• Prof. Zingales of U. of Chicago: Why Paulson is Wrong
• EconLog: A Simpler Solution

The Proposal That Does Cost $700 Billion ($700,000,000,000)

• The text of The-Law-That-Must-Not-Be-Passed (Politico)

Reasons Why Handing $700 Billion to Anybody Is Stupid

• Why You Should Hate the Treasury Bailout (Politico)
• Many Economists Skeptical of Bailout (Politico)
• To Whom And For What? (Interfluidity)
• WaPo: Bush Fatigue Hits Bush (Clearly outlines the “crisis mode” power-expansion method used by Bush’s administration)
• WaPo: A Bad Bank Rescue