Bailout Sellout

From Tony Perkins, of the FRC:

“What do NASCAR, the Motion Picture Association, and Puerto Rico rum makers have in common? They all stand to benefit from the Senate’s $700 billion economic bailout plan.

“Hoping to entice the bill’s skeptics with some familiar bait, the upper chamber sweetened its deal with more than a billion dollars in tax breaks for special interests. As the Dow plummets, unnerving investors from coast to coast, the House has approved the Senate’s bill. With the economy hanging in the balance, more responsible members were faced with the question-to pork or not to pork? And while the Senate managed to slip in relief for manufacturers of toy arrows, its quiver contained little for American families.

“As the sun sets on President Bush’s tax cuts in 2010, leaders may use these amendments to leave the impression that the major tax issues have been addressed. They couldn’t be more wrong. To restore confidence we must actively pursue tax simplification and permanent tax relief. Energizing the economy means expanding the IRS’s grace not to a handful of niche markets, as the Senate suggests, but to all Americans, especially American families.

“If our leaders are this determined to bail out Wall Street, how much more concerned should they be with rescuing the family from our suffocating tax policy?”

From The Center for Responsive Politics:

“The emergency economic plan has made it out of Congress, and it looks like the financial sector’s friends were the bill’s biggest supporters. Members of the House of Representatives who voted Friday afternoon in favor of the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 had received 41 percent more money from the financial sector over their congressional careers than those who opposed the legislation, the Center for Responsive Politics has found. In Wednesday’s Senate vote, and in the House vote Monday that defeated an earlier version of the bailout proposal, campaign contributions from the finance, insurance and real estate sector correlated similarly to lawmakers’ votes…” (more)

Jon Henke, on The Next Right, notes: “We’re all homeowners, now:”

 

Blue Collar Muse follows up on this thought with:

“Unfortunately, there were far too many Republicans who voted for this abomination. As my friend notes, We’re All Homeowners Now. Good luck getting any benefit out of that mortgage you own, though. It’s yours to pay for and someone else’s to enjoy.

“Thank you Democrats. To those Republicans who voted “Yea”, nice to know that Smaller Government, Lower Tax platform you all are so well known for is so personally inspiring to you.”

Leslie Carbone encourages those of us who fought this, in “A Time to Hope“:

“…For four days, we held Leviathan off. Against an Administration that prizes cronyism over competency and stampedes over dissenters, against the inclination of politicians to slurp up power like chocolate milkshakes, against a Wall-Street lobby that has tons of money to buy pols and ads to proclaim its dire financial straits, we held Leviathan off. Against all the doomsday talk, the cynical appeals to the greed, laziness, and irresponsibility that beset human nature, and the knee-jerk reflex to do something, anything, no matter how bad, we held Leviathan off…(more)”

And in response to Leslie, “Tessie’s Dad” posted what he calls “An original limerick for the occasion:”

There once was a federal bailout
Of bankers too dumb to doubt
The loans that they made
Would ever be repaid;
Taxpayers have just been sold out.