Pelosi: It’s not a bailout, it’s a buy-in

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Your Congress and your president (I don’t want ‘em, you can have ‘em) have again agreed on a $700-billion bailout, and this time they say they really mean it. Headlines and links first, and then as always I’d like to hear your thoughts.

The Los Angeles Times: ‘Congressional and administration officials unveiled their $700-billion rescue plan for Wall Street today, setting up the largest government intervention in the economy since the Great Depression.’

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, evidently with a straight face: ‘This is not about a bailout of Wall Street. It’s a buy-in so we can turn our economy around’ and protect the assets of ordinary Americans. Well, now I feel so much better about it. I’m buying in! I’m getting a piece of financial products that are so worthless that there’s no market for them.

The New York Times: ‘Congress braced for a difficult vote on a $700 billion rescue of the financial markets after a weekend of tense negotiations produced a plan that Congressional leaders began selling to lawmakers on Sunday as significantly strengthened by new taxpayer safeguards.

‘The 106-page bill, intended to ease a growing credit crisis, came after a frenzied week of political twists and turns and still faced some resistance from lawmakers on both the left and right who portrayed it as a dangerous rush to economic judgment.

Bold Bipartisan Leadership for Change department: The New York Times reports, ‘The two presidential candidates ... both gave guarded endorsements of the bailout plan Sunday.’

-- Peter Viles

Your thoughts? Comments?

Photo Credit: A.P.