Except that going into the vote Dem and GOP leadership agreed on the numbers. They wanted 125-140 from the Dems and 80-100 from the GOP. The Dems got 140 - the very high end of their target. The House GOP leaders were unable to get their votes. And it had nothing to do with Pelosi or her speech. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/29/AR2008092903523_pf.html Your attempts to place partisan blame are both pathetic and not supported by facts.
The FACT that Pelosi allowed 13 Democrats in her own State of California to vote NO speaks volumes. She gives the blessing of 95 democrats to vote no because she doesn't want them to lose elections. Who's playing politics now? Then she's gonna say it's the Republicans fault? No wonder Congress has a 10% approval rating. BOTH parties are at fault. When the two party leaders came into their "agreement" the details of the plan weren't even drawn up yet. Then when it came to the process of outlining those details, Pelosi, Franks, and the other Dems didn't even want the Repubs to be a part of that process. We still have yet to know exactly what went down. However, it was stupid for BOTH party leaders to speak on behalf of the other reps before securing those votes. The way they promoted this plan was horrible. It's why many Americans called up their congressmen and told them to NOT vote for it. Congress did a horrible job AGAIN.
Why bankruptcy is the right answer. From an economist from that radical right-wing Harvard University. http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/09/29/miron.bailout/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
Please. It was a crappy bill. Proposed by the Republican administration. Created by the Republican Secretary of Treasury. Supported by the Republican President. The Republican VP twisted as many arms as he could. Pushed by the Republican Congressional leadership. This was a Republican bill all the way. If the Repubs had wanted it to pass, it would have passed. But what's this? Newt's still around? Utter and complete disarray in the Republican ranks. A former Speaker lobbying behind the current Minority Leader's back? Are you kidding me? And someone here thinks Pelosi is the worst Speaker ever? Laughable. If you take a cynical approach like I do, it's clear the Repubs wanted this to pass on the backs of Dem votes co they could campaign against it, so once again Newt rides to the rescue of the Democratic Party. Thanks Newt. By the way, we know they wanted it to pass with Dem votes because the RNC immediately went up with an anti-Obama ad... before the vote! So let's just stop this tripe about Dems having responsibility for passing a very Republican bill supported by the Administration and the Republican leadership in Congress. These guys really wanted it to pass so they could blame Dems for it and try to rescue this election cycle by the most cynical means. They even had ads to run before the vote was cast that give this strategy away. But they couldn't curtail Newt, who was exhibiting more leadership than the whole group. We definitely see which party is really split. And again, I am thankful for Newt. He once again rescued the Dem Party from stupidity by invoking a greater degree of stupidity and he torpedoed this very bad bill, even if it was for the wrong reasons. If all this wasn't so serious, it'd be funny.
You do realize this is not a dictatorship, right? You realize this is a Republican-led bill that was offered by the White House? This is factually incorrect. The vote agreement was after the final bill was drawn up Sunday. This is factually incorrect. The House GOP got numerous concessions between Thursday and Sunday, when the final bill was put together. This is factually incorrect. The House GOP leaders told us they were surprised and disappointed that they couldn't get the votes. This part is certainly true. They marketed it very badly, and a number of people put their own personal interests ahead of the nation. Every one of those people should be voted out of Congress.
I hope to impress upon people the importance of the bill as well as the importance of the timing of the bill, i.e. why we can't wait "a couple of weeks" like some suggested. Let me start by saying that I am a conservative (though not a Republican). So when even I think the bailout is necessary, I hope people can see the severity of the problem. Prudential Short Fund went on record the other day saying the Dow could reach 6000. I'm not so doom and gloom but I could see it hitting the 8000's. The only thing that could have had a chance to prevent it was the bailout package. Now, supporting the bailout doesn't mean you like it. I don't. And I'll tell you why I don't. It is money the US will have to pay sooner or later. So my view was this: as you know, today is fiscal year end for the government. If bailout goes through, the banks are saved but the broader economy takes the hit. If it fails, the banks fail and the broader economy will take a hit as well. As a matter of fact, I plan to short like crazy once the financial short bans are lifted come October 2, with a call option of course and I've amassed 200 grand cash to cover for margin calls, though I doubt I'll need it (if anyone asks, you didn't hear anything from me). So the bailout package is the difference between a hard landing and a crash landing. No I don't like it, but not bailing out the financial system would be a lot worse. Secondly, the timing of the issue. As you might already know, we are at a time when several pretty lousy events all lumped together. I've already mentioned the fiscal year end. In a couple of days you'll get the economic reports, it won't be pretty. Furthermore, as you may know, Congress broke for the Jewish holidays today, and boy there are a lot of them in October. The first day they come back is gasp, the day the financial short ban is lifted. As soon as the bill was introduced I said to myself, they better pass this or it will be two weeks before we see the package. That is now looking quite optimistic. Even IF they pass it on Thursday, it'll still have to go through the Senate, while the US economy is bleeding money. All of this could have been clearly seen as soon as the short ban was applied (or for people in the know, even earlier) but Congress still *****ed it up. Make no mistakes about it ladies and gentlemen, we are in historic times ladies and gentlemen. The problem is that it's a sh1tty one.
Since when does the MINORITY party lead in any type of Bill of this magnitude? If that is the case then Pelosi and the Dems that allowed this to happen REALLY need to be out of office!
The republicans are really to blame and if they keep mentioning the mark to market rule and the solution then i'm going to puke. If the mark to market rule will solve anything than the USA would be IDIOTIC not to buy these assets at market values which are cheaper. The indirect damage through lack of liquidity for businesses can potentially snowball and adversely affect the value of the securities that the US will ultimately buy. They also keep mentioning that we're 'bailing out' foreign banks. In a reverse auction, you want more bidders at the table to ensure the US is paying the lowest price possible for the assets. Including foreign entities benefits the US taxpayer. So their two main issues of mark to market and foreign entities actually have it make more sense to do the 700 bailout.
The minority party doesn't lead - they participate. In this case, it was a bill that was brought to the table by the Republican Party though, in the form of the White House and Treasury. This is a bill that is originated with Republicans and is nationally supported more by Republicans than Democrats. It is designed to stem a crisis that is perceived to have been caused by Republicans (whether or not true). The Democrats did lead - they took the Paulson proposal, worked with the minority party in both the House and the Senate, and crafted a bill all leaders on all sides agreed to. The two sides worked out a deal to get the votes they need. In this case, the Dems got the votes they agreed upon; the GOP did not.
Why then, would Treasury officials tell Streeters on a conference call that it would be a few weeks before the cash was available and that in the interim, they wanted to see who else would fail?
Um, are you kidding? So the bill passes and poof the money just appears? It has be raise, borrowed or otherwise found to be made available. There is a reason Paulson stated that NOT all $700 billion will be in place right away. It can't be done. But delaying the bill means instead of "a few weeks," you are adding an additional "few weeks" to stretch the time line to month and half, two, maybe longer. Had the bill passed yesterday, it doesn't mean the economy is out of the sh1thole, but it would go a long way to sooth investors and creditors.
I agree very much with the entire paragraph with an exception of the last sentence. That ignorant divisive language is the same nonsense that Pelosi spewed at the last second. That probably swayed a number of votes. I just don't understand her lunacy in that, don't talk about bi-partisan actions and then make that kind of speech. I blame the republicans for not voting for this as a political statement, but this was a bizzare move by Pelosi.
Thanks for the link. Really, the evidence that McCain and the Republicans saw this through partisan eyes is incontrovertible. Thanks Newt... this move should really help your 2012 run for the White House.
Mark to market is not the only thing, but it does have major implications on banks operation. I remember talking to a couple ibankers way back before all this mess started to unravel, they were already complaining how much price adjustments they had to make just quarter to quarter, how much loss they had to bring onto the books even though the assets were not sold yet.
Because the core reason to pass the bill immediately is to shore up confidence and get the credit markets moving again. Every day lost, the credit markets get worse and more and more people have a big problem. The money itself is going to be spent over a long period of time, estimated at about $50B/month, so most of it would likely be spent by an Obama admin and Obama SecTreas anyway. The bill isn't designed to save failed financial institutions. It's to keep the healthy ones from crashing. This is why the gov't let WaMu and others go under. This is the core of why it's not a "Wall Street Bailout". The Wall Street firms that messed up are still going to get screwed. The bill is just designed to not let them suck the rest of the economy down anyway.
Absolutely - not having M2M might have prevented this crisis to some extent (though potentially with a larger crisis down the road if it encouraged bad habits). But changing the rule now won't undo the crisis.
The rest of the world is too busy nationalizing/buying equity stakes in their exposed banks to recapitalize them. I still don't know why the US doesn't just take such straight forward action. OK, well I do know why: As Newt supposedly argues, this is the slippery slope to socialism. Whatever. If we are gonna socialize the risk via these toxic instruments, then why not socialize the gains via equity stakes?
