House Republicans: No Bailout Until After Election Day

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The only thing coming from Republcans and Democrats to let us know how dire things are is that we may not be able to get a car loan, whew! And after my job being given to foreigners here on H1-B visas, my stock tumbling to .98 cents from the 10.00 I bought it for 28 years ago, having no health insurance and hoping I die before I get sick, that's very comforting. And you can get that for only 700 billion per installment. These guys are selling a load of crap. All the little concessions and pay caps put in by the Democrats are either unenforceable or left to the discretion of Treasury. In fact, Paulson has called the executives and told them that their contracts would not be affected. Guess we're going to cap someone in the future who had no part in this mess. There's a reason they're all telling us that we may be able to get a loan because that's all this bill will do for Mr. and Mrs. America.
There's no promise that it will indeed "trickle down" or that it will bring your investments back up because there's no evidence that it will and hundreds of economists think it will just prolong the pain. Vote them all out.

Kokko of PA 8:10PM September 30, 2008

Wake up those of you who cower in fear! This bailout won't help anything if they DO get it passed, because it will require the Fed to PRINT MORE MONEY, which means INFLATION, which means LOSS OF THE DOLLARS VALUE. You'll see.

Cassandra of CA 6:51PM September 30, 2008

The economy reacts in the short term. Long-term consequences are harder to gauge. Yesterday, stocks fell 778 points. Today, they're up 486. The market has had drops of 300 points quite often, and rises of nearly equal that just as often in the last year.
The 'bailout' was flawed - a knee-jerk reaction to a perceived crisis that doesn't exist. Yes, the lending banks are collapsing. But their collapse will not lead to a depression - as many have predicted - if the government acts, instead of reacts, to this issue.
Policy needs to be drafted that creates a considered and deliberate approach to the problem. Throwing money at it (which was the equivalent of what the bail-out legislation did) will not loosen up tight credit markets nearly as well as restructuring the way those markets do business. Spending money the government doesn't have further devalues the dollar, leading to higher prices and a much greater chance of recession due to that undervalued dollar.
But by creating growth opportunities, restructuring rules that frees up (at least on paper) future capital and creating a market in which credit is given to deserving customers is a far better plan.
The bailout was not a cure-all and the constant tweaking of the economic system by the government would have led to further market instability - as demonstrated by yesterday and today's market activity. The longer we look at the causes behind this fiscal mess, and take our time to address it, the better the chance of preventing a major collapse of the global financial markets (which is unlikely anyhow) and the faster the US recovery will be.

Fatesrider of CA 4:47PM September 30, 2008

I am college educated, 60 years old, a Realtor for 20 years. My husband is a 70 year old veterinarian who owns his own practice. We have owned our home for 25 years, but refinanced 3 years ago to keep our business afloat. We have been hanging by a thread in the prosperous "Republican Economy" for years. In our staunchly Republican state there are no laws against predatory lending for commercial lenders (Usury Laws). It is dog eat dog and every man for himself, the Republican Way!
We both have seen our businesses erode due to the pressure on the economy for all of our customers. Countrywide Mortgage refinanced our home at 91/2% and a $15,000 pre-payment penalty. The market here is so bad that we have lost over $100,000 in equity in our home. Our story is a common one, and I doubt that anything Congress can do will ever help people like us.
We almost don't care any more. we can live on the cheap like we did as newlyweds. We just want to see the Republicans GONE.

Phoenician Lady of AZ 4:36PM September 30, 2008

let the gov buy all the loans that are in or are headed in that direction of foreclosure
rewrite a afordable new contract this would do some thing

stan of CA 4:23PM September 30, 2008

"Lots of us have lots to lose in a coming depression/recession. But we are saying "Bring It On...we will get by because we are Americans, and we will lift ourselves by our bootstraps until we can rebuild something out of the wreckage." Better to lose some worthless mortgages, over-valued cars, and egg head financiers, than to lose our integrity and core values."
You hit the nail on the head. And yet all the pundits are saying we rejected the bail out because we don't understand that it will hurt us if congress does nothing. What dunder-heads. Of course facing up to a problem hurts. My husband and I are near retirement age and our 401k took a killing yesterday. So be it. We cannot and will not allow our government to attempt to borrow their way out of this mess. And I certainly don't trust the idiots who got us into this mess to fix it. I worked the phones all weekend against the bail out and yesterday was one of the proudest days of my life.

Karen Jones of CA 4:18PM September 30, 2008

It is frightening, reading the prior comments here, how few people seem to have the slightest idea what the so-called "bailout" would and would not accomplish and how it would work. The government stands a good chance of ending up *making* money off the deal, something they have done with other, previous "bailouts".
The government is not just giving money away: it is buying assets. Those assets have, at present, very low values owing to the very scare the bill addresses, but that does not affect their underlying, long-term value, nor the fact that they are collateralized.
That is not to say that the bill is wonderful. As economists keep saying, "the devil's in the details", in this case the question of deciding exactly how many cents on the dollar the Treasury should spend on those assets. What is wanted is some time to analyze that issue, and perhaps tweak the bill; but if it passed exactly as it is, it's scarcely any disaster or "giveaway". Look it up.

Eric Walker of WA 4:16PM September 30, 2008

let the gov buy all the loans that are in or are headed in that direction of foreclosure
rewrite a afordable new contract this would do some thing

stan of CA 4:05PM September 30, 2008

Those in favor of the Bulbous Bailout are shrieking about lack of leadership, moaning that the sky is falling, and telling us we don't know how bad it can get. Their wailing is supposed to make me shake with fear.
Well guess what . . I'm immune to them. Why? I've learned to live with fear. In fact, I live with fear on a daily basis. For instance:
I'm afraid of freezing this winter due to the price of heating oil.
I'm afraid I won't have enough money to put gas in my car to go to a job that I'm afraid may have gone to someone overseas.
I'm afraid I'll never be able to retire.
I'm afraid I may lose the house I have owned for 32 years.
I'm afraid my property taxes are going up (again!).
I'm afraid to get sick because I don't have health insurance.
I'm afraid Social Security just won't be there when the time comes for me to start collecting.
I'm afraid my kids won't get student loans.
I'm afraid my savings will be eaten up by my day-to-day struggles to survive.
I'm afraid I'll have to choose between keeping the heat on or the lights on this winter.
I'm NOT afraid of the evil people on Wall Street, the politicians and the Media drones.
Everyday I wake up and do what I have done for the last 40 years, which is go to work and try to provide for my family.
If you politicians and Wall Street know-it-alls have more scare tactics for me? BRING IT ON. I don't flinch anymore.
By the way, Paulson's greedy grab for unbridled power is what's really scary.

Michele of NJ 3:07PM September 30, 2008

This 700 billion dollar check will only add fuel to the fire that is our economy. 700 billion has already been spent on Fanny/Freddie/AIG and the JP bailout of Bear Sterns and another 630 billion was injected into the market by the Fed amid all the market turmoil yesterday (i might add that few media outlets noticed). Do people think that an additional 700 billion dollars will not stop this snowball from rolling through the markets? There are going to be tough times ahead, but we the people of the US stood up and said we want them to come. I am actually amazed that our representative finally listened to our voices instead of the serpent tongue of lobbyists. Credit contraction is a natural reaction to the debt driven society that we've turned into. When housing prices are still 100% higher than they were in 2002, prices must come down. We don't all deserve Mercedes and Mansions and i think we are all realizing this. Thank you Congress for finally standing up for the Republic and showing what real patriotism is.

Chris of NJ 3:00PM September 30, 2008