BlackPerspective.net
Discussing the Diaspora as seen through an internal Black lens
The Wall Street Welfare BailOut Is Now Law
October 3rd, 2008
Now with more pork! They loaded it up with an extra 150 billion dollars of extra ear marks to make it an 850 billion dollar “bail out”.
G Dub has already signed it in to law.
The house basically voted against the bill last week just so they could load it up with pork and vote in a bigger piece of corporate welfare this week.
And guess who led the way, the congressional black caucus changed their votes from no to yes based on promises from Barack. Great!
I think I’m going to vote against ever Tennessee member of the legislature who voted for this bill.
This is an astounishing piece of legislation. The congress is completely out of control, and all we ever do is send the same people back up their again and again. Some how we expect we can do the same thing with the same people and get new results. Becuase of course it’s not your beloved congressmen that’s the problem, its everone elses.
Congress OKs historic bailout bill; Bush signs it
By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS and DAVID ESPO, Associated Press Writers
WASHINGTON - With the economy on the brink and elections looming, Congress approved an unprecedented $700 billion government bailout of the battered financial industry on Friday and sent it to President Bush who quickly signed it.
“We have acted boldly to help prevent the crisis on Wall Street from becoming a crisis in communities across our country,” Bush said shortly after the vote, although he conceded, “our economy continues to face serious challenges.”
Underscoring that somber warning, the Dow Jones industrials, up more than 200 points at the time of the House vote, had fallen into negative territory an hour later. They fluctuated as the afternoon wore on.
The final vote, 263-171 in the House, capped two weeks of tumult in Congress and on Wall Street, punctuated by daily warnings that the country confronted the gravest economic crisis since the Great Depression if lawmakers failed to act. There were 58 more votes for the measure than an earlier version that failed on Monday.
“We all know that we are in the midst of a financial crisis,” House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio said shortly before casting his vote for a massive government intervention in private capital markets that was unthinkable only a month ago.
“And we know that if we do nothing, this crisis is likely to worsen and to put us into an economic slump like most of us have never seen,” he said.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said the bill was needed to “begin to shape the financial stability of our country and the economic security of our people.”
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson pledged to begin using his new authority quickly, and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the central bank would work closely with the administration.
Wall Street welcomed the action, but investors also were buffeted by a bad report on the job market. The Labor Department said employers slashed 159,000 jobs in September, the largest cut in five years and further evidence of a sinking economy.
At its core, the bill gives the Treasury Department $700 billion to purchase bad mortage-related securities that are weighing down the balance sheets of institutions that hold them. The flow of credit in the U.S. economy has slowed, in some cases drying up, threatening the ability of businesses to conduct routine operations or expand, and adversely affecting consumers seeking financing for mortgages, cars and student loans. Some state governments have also experienced difficulty borrowing money.
The House vote marked a sharp change from Monday, when an earlier measure was sent down to defeat, largely at the hands of angry conservative Republicans.
On Friday, 91 Republicans joined 172 Democrats to support the bill, while 108 Republicans and 68 Democrats opposed it. Twenty-five Republicans and 33 Democrats switched their votes from “no” to “yes.” One Democrat who supported Monday’s version, Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington, opposed the bill Friday. One Republican who didn’t vote Monday, Rep. Jerry Weller of Illinois, voted “yes” on Friday.
Several of the Democrats who switched were members of the Congressional Black Caucus who said presidential candidate Barack Obama had pledged to support legislation easing the burden on consumers if he wins the White House.
Republican presidential candidate John McCain also lobbied for the measure, according to aides who declined to release a list of lawmakers he called.
posted in Politics, Socio-Economic | | | View blog reactions |
5 Responses to “The Wall Street Welfare BailOut Is Now Law”
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Yobachi Boswell is creator and publisher of BlackPerspecitve.net. I’m a writer, activist and political watcher based in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve also been know to do some spoken word and MCing in my day.
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Hello,
I have my concerns about the bailout. I think it is necessary because listening to analyst from other countries the US financial problems run deep. I understand the US dollar could collapse. It’s not like the dollar is strong especially against the euro. I hope there is enough oversight in the bill.
This is why it is important to vote in this election. I’m glad you are spreading the word. This election is a do or die moment. It will hurt the minority communties the hardest, it already has with the sub prime loans. People gain wealth by home ownership.
Today, Gov.Schwarzenegger said California needs 7billion dollars in order to meet payroll at the end of the month. California has the eighth largest economy in the world. If California needs financial help I’m sure other states need help, too.
Should have passed the first time. My feeling is McCain made it rather a spectacle and politicized it to the detriment of millions of almost retired people who will not recover the trillion dollar loss to their retirement funds which happened the day after if failed to pass. The contagion of politics spread and instead of doing what they should have done in passing the bill the congress started to worry more about getting reelected and started listening to their constituents - this is one case where they should not have and they knew it, they should have had the guts to go ahead. Worry more about being reelected than what needed to be done they fucked up.
Susan and Cooper thanks for your responses.
I think something had to be done about the situation; but not doing just anything. I not only don’t think it should have been passed the first time, it should have never been proposed.
If these bailouts solved problems, why do we have to do a new one every 15 years? Big business knows they can just keep doing this and not pay a prices, because they know the government will bail them out with our money, while we can barely afford to pay our winter heating bills.
It seems to me that when the Treasury Sec. hands in a 3-page bill, which maybe all that was needed, it begs to wonder: didn’t they know the U.S. Economy was heading down the crapper? (I did as far back as March…Bear Stearnes.)
After digesting the analysis done by Wall Street and seeing banks, insurance companies and automakers line up at the Treasury soup kitchen, I was also bemused by the quirks and stupid stuff added.
Help America - rebuild and reinvest in real Americans. Finance has to be improved but we need to figure out how people can make income to pay for those houses that got this all started.