In a moment of historic drama in the Capitol and on Wall Street, the House of Representatives voted on Monday to reject a $700 billion rescue of the financial industry.
The vote against the measure was 228 to 205. Supporters vowed to try to bring the rescue package up for consideration against as soon as possible.
Stock markets plunged sharply at midday as it appeared that the measure was go down.
…
Representative Darrell Issa, a Republican, said he was “resolute” in his opposition to the measure because it would betray party principles and amount to “a coffin on top of Ronald Reagan’s coffin.”
The bailout plan doesn’t include any extension of unemployment benefits or food stamps, nor does it include tax deductions (or as Grampy oops-I-lost-another-word McCain kept calling them in Friday’s debate: tax dividends) for credit card interest or any help for those drowning under usurious credit card interest rates.
But it failed because House Republicans can’t stomach interfering in that holy of holies, the Great and Glorious Market.
I believe the market is due for a significant correction, so despite what it’s doing to my Roth IRA, I’m realistic about what’s happening to the Dow just now, and I want the Dems to hold out for a bill that really helps those in the lower 40% of income.
But with Republicans refusing to come on board because the bailout besmirches their Randian fantasies won’t help get any kind of bill onto Bush’s desk.
Hartmann was right on the money this morning on the bailout. The Feds should nationalize all the financial institutions, cut CEO pay to reasonable levels, oversee the organizations until the market stabilizes and renegotiate mortgages to 30 years with a fixed interest rate.
But instead we are probably going to learn this lesson the hard way.
At least the House is taking a while before they cave.
PS: What Hartmann did not address though is that the Federal government has been corrupted too. So who is going to regulate the regulators? No matter, Congress doesn’t have the backbone to do any of this and we know for sure who Bush works for and it taint us.