As of a couple of weeks ago, I was still receiving unsolicited offers from JPMorgan/Chase to borrow up to $35,000 at 3.9% interest forever. It's not clear to me that the credit system is completely frozen.

Only yesterday, some guy rang my doorbell and tried to sell me a "home improvements" package that included "very quick, easy credit" and extra money in my pocket as a byproduct.

I didn't listen to all the details, but he did give me a blurb sheet that I kept.

Transaction declined. Your "Trust Me" card is overdrawn.

For years, Republicans have given Bush everything he wanted and defended him from criticism. Now, in the twilight of his administration, Bush has showed his gratitude by torpedoing the entire Republican party with elections barely more than a month away. Bush screwed the American people and his own party just to give his "base" a final huge bite of the nation's financial resources.

Enjoy the results, suckers.

... McCain will be searching for photo opportunities that might help create the illusion that he had something to do with the deal.

... on whether or not there will be roll call votes on this abomination? My guess is that congress will chicken out and use voice votes.

I just shined my tinfoil hat, and I started to wonder if this whole bailout plan is just a bit of political theater: Bush plays the bad guy with the evil plan, Democrats get stuck in the role of suckers, and McCain rides in and saves the day by killing the deal.

He thinks Bush's plan is intended to bail out his campaign.

John McCain's method, on the other hand is to do the hard legislative work.

By showing up at the last minute and throwing a monkey wrench into a deal that had been worked on for days? Any jerk can ruin the work of others.

I'll hold my judgement until I see what McCain has to offer, but I won't hold my breath waiting because McCain has already admitted many times that economics isn't his strong suit.

I think McCain wants to get his name on the deal so he can claim credit if it works, and then vote against it so he can claim he tried to stop it if it fails.

I know of one alternative bailout plan proposed by the Republican Study Group, a group of conservative House representatives. But it's a laughingstock -- a four-point manifesto that calls for suspending the capital gains tax for two years, privatizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, suspending some accounting standards, and stabilizing the dollar.

I think another element of the deal was that the bailout would be funded entirely by private investment money. If this is true, then perhaps it's not such a bad idea: Give the rich boys a favorable environment let them spend their own money getting out of the hole they dug. I have doubts that such a plan would work, but I also have doubts that the current deal would work any better.

... why couldn't you do this 5 years ago with Iraq?

I have a better idea: What if American companies starting bringing back the jobs they've sent overseas? Maybe more people could afford houses if they had decent-paying jobs.

And walter_map is done talking about it. Nobody wants to listen. You guys are on your own.

I've been reading your posts, and I think they are interesting. I haven't replied because $1200 Trillion - sized problems are way out of my league.

The Dems hold the majority in the House. They do not need the support of the Republicans to pass this bill. If they really believed in it, they should pass it on their own and stop playing politics.

I don't recall any reports of Democratic legislators saying that they "really believed in" Bush's plan. I think belief is part of the problem.

Bush gave no warning before sending his plan to congress, and he insisted that immediate action was imperative. There supposedly isn't enough time for congress to do their own fact-checking to see if Bush's plan even has a prayer of producing the desired results.

Bush has done this sort of thing before, and the results haven't been very satisfactory. The fact that Bush's own party won't back him up adds to the doubts. I think Democrats have good reason to balk if Bush can't persuade his own party to go along.

There's also the ugly political angle that Democrats passing the bill on only their own votes would give Republicans a nice get-out-of-jail-free card if the plan doesn't work and voters go apeshit. It's very clever of the Republicans to try to make Democrats take the blame for their own policy failure, but I don't think even the Democrats are that stupid.

Sarah Palin seems to have a problem with lying.

I beg to differ. I think she does it quite easily and readily.

Let them wait, and let a few more die in the meantime. This is a situation where prompt action by congress would send exactly the wrong message to the Wall Street criminals. Letting more of them die might make the survivors less likely to try high-risk shenannigans again.

If you want to protect your money, you need to diversify and invest at least some of it overseas.

Investing overseas is exactly what I expect the "rescued" investors to do, which is why I don't think the bailout will do much (if any) good.

I can't imagine banks having much appetite for reasonable mortgages while the value of homes is still declining. I also think potential home buyers will postpone their purchases as long as waiting might get them a better price. There's also the ugly problem that the cost of living is going up faster than peoples' incomes. None of this points to a near future end in the decline in home prices.