Month: September 2008

Robert Reich has a prediction:

A scaled-down bill will be enacted by the end of the week. It will provide the Treasury with a first installment of $150 billion. Treasury can use it to back Wall Street’s bad debts with lend no-interest loans of up to two years, until the housing market rebounds. Or to invest in Wall Street houses directly, in exchange for stocks and stock warrants. There will be strict oversight. Congressional leaders will promise further installments, but with conditions calling for limits on salaries and relief to distressed homeowners.

Not too bad really, is it?

Sangworn, a mahout (elephant driver), stands with his elephant, Bussaba, 13 years old, at his temporary camp September 26, 2008 in Bangkok, Thailand. While the elephant is a symbol of Thailand, it is a fairly common site to see the unemployed and homeless animals roaming the city streets begging for food. By Paula Bronstein/Getty.

Nate Silver:

It’s highly likely that some sort of bill will pass the Congress. What kind of bill, I don’t know. But the Dow is liable to act as something of a thermostat. The lower the Dow goes, affecting people’s 401Ks, the more banks that fail, the less unpopular the bailout becomes, and the more of those swing district congressmen will flip over to support the package.

Unless, of course, we come to realize that letting these banks fail under their rotten loans is not the end of the world. If the world doesn’t end, wouldn’t the bailout lose more support?

“What Sen. McCain was able to do … was to help get all of the parties to the table. There had been announcements by Senate leaders saying that a deal had been reached earlier in the week. There were no votes for that deal. Sen. McCain knew time was short and he came back, he listened and he helped put together the framework of getting everybody to the table, which was necessary to produce a package to avoid a financial catastrophe for this country," – Steve Schmidt, McCain campaign "strategist," yesterday.

Megan is uneasy:

A journalist friend who spends way more time on politics than I do suggests that if the Democrats cave and include a capital gains tax, it will probably pass–but puts the odds of the Democrats caving at slim to none, since they can now blame any resulting crash on the Republicans.

I didn’t think it was possible to be more disgusted with politicians than I usually am, but I find it impossible to express the seething contempt that I feel at this kind of opportunism.  I don’t mind when they screw with the normal operation of the economy for venal personal gain.  But risking a recession in order to get a cut in the capital gains tax?  Letting it tank because you can always blame it on the Republicans? 

How about nominating Palin in wartime? I don’t remember Megan panicking about that.

Marc distributes blame for the bailout’s failure.

Ambers has the right question about McCain’s spin on the farce of Palin:

How is a pizza joint question about Pakistan from a voter an example of "gotcha journalism" when a ropeline comment by Joe Biden about clean coal gets turned into two ads?

He’s still in denial isn’t he? Do we really want four more years of a president who cannot see reality in front of him?

RCP crunches the numbers, and the trend is ominous for the GOP in the last week. 538 is now putting Florida into the lean-Democrat column. Pollster still gives McCain the edge.

Yes, it can get worse:

The Palin aide, after first noting how "infuriating" it was for CBS to purportedly leak word about the gaffe, revealed that it came in response to a question about Supreme Court decisions. After noting Roe vs. Wade, Palin was apparently unable to discuss any major court cases.

There was no verbal fumbling with this particular question as there was with some others, the aide said, but rather silence.

Just let it sink in.

Clouds move across the sky on Mars. The sun rises. Snow falls – but never touches the ground.