Bailout bill gets tangled up in views
Whenever a big package makes its way through Congress, it inevitably gets bigger. Items get added. New proposals are proposed. And while the stakes may be higher with the financial bailout proposal, this time's no different. Bob Moon reports.
Republican Rep. Jim McCrery of Louisiana speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill on Sept. 26, 2008, in Washington, D.C. McCrery and other GOP lawmakers voiced opposition to a Wall Street bailout plan. (Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images)
More on The Economy, Wall Street, America's Financial Crisis
TEXT OF STORY
KAI RYSSDAL: About the only thing that's stayed consistent with this story this week is how quickly it's been changing. We're going to talk a little bit about that. About the current state of negotiations. About a little bank failure that happened last night. And a look back at the week that was.
We'll begin, though, with what you might call a buying opportunity for congressional lawmakers. Whenever a big package makes its way through the legistlative process it inevitably gets bigger. Items get added. New proposals are proposed. And while the stakes may be higher, this time's no different. Our senior business correspondent Bob Moon explains.
BOB MOON: If the definition of a compromise is that no one walks away completely happy, maybe there's hope Washington can still find some kind of common ground. But it clearly isn't easy.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid complained today that Republican mavericks need to get real:
HARRY REID: Are they serious about one of the issues that has to be taken care of is lowering the capital gains tax? Is that part of what this is all about?
Here's an issue that is being taken seriously: The need to help Main Street as much as Wall Street, by helping strapped homeowners make their payments.
John Taylor heads the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, an advocacy group for subprime borrowers:
JOHN TAYLOR: We saw 300,000 foreclosures last month. That's what we used to get in a year. If you don't get ahead of that problem, you're going to continue to have to go back to Wall Street to bail them out.
EDWARD FREDERICKS: The big sticking point has to be, well, what about the little guy? Doesn't he or she have to bear a little bit of responsibility here?
Edward Fredericks is a finance professor at California's Pepperdine University. He says sorting out which homeowners really deserve help is tricky:
FREDERICKS: Not everybody was truthful on their mortgage application. There are a lot of people out there that tried to rig the system themselves.
Fredericks also says the idea of simply insuring toxic mortgage-backed securities is much more complicated than buying them outright, as the Bush administration wants. Until those securities are sold, he says, it's impossible to know how much to insure them for.
Some in Congress and elsewhere are pushing for the federal government to get equity stakes in the companies taking part in the rescue -- essentially charging for seats on the lifeboat. But critics argue that could further sap the strength of banks already in danger of sinking.
Professor Fredericks says there's a danger of trying to do too much. Congress could blunt the psychological impact of sure and swift action.
FREDERICKS: What could happen is then we might slowly kind of just wallow here as we wait for this very dim light at the end of the tunnel to get much brighter.
And Senate leader Harry Reid suggests Wall Street needs action, not perfection:
REID: No matter what we do here will be imperfect, but we have to do something for the American people.
In other words, choose your poison.
I'm Bob Moon for Marketplace.
Comments
Comment | Refresh
From CA, 09/29/2008
URGENT MESSAGE RE: WALL STREET BAILOUT... Hello, We need to be promoting this option in the public conversation... Watch this short video "The Rip Off Of The Century... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdsnIYurpSM Solving the Wall Street Financial Crisis: Monetary Reform... http://groups.google.com/group/sf911truth/browse_thread/thread/fd4de7c7193cba29?pli=1 Please help republish these messages, and let's get our representatives talking about this option.. now is the time to strike while the iron is hot, we could use this moment to truly get our country back!
09/29/2008
URGENT MESSAGE RE: WALL STREET BAILOUT...
Hello, We need to be promoting this option in the public conversation...
Watch this short video "The Rip Off Of The Century... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdsnIYurpSM
Solving the Wall Street Financial Crisis: Monetary Reform... http://groups.google.com/group/sf911truth/browse_thread/thread/fd4de7c7193cba29?pli=1
Please help republish these messages, and let's get our representatives talking about this option.. now is the time to strike while the iron is hot, we could use this moment to truly get our country back!
From huntington beach, CA, 09/28/2008
If you want to hear the best explanation of the problem, how we got here, and the issues going forward, go to the BBC website. watch this 55 minute video
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7636497.stm
Post a Comment: Please be civil, brief and relevant.
Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments. All comments are moderated. Marketplace reserves the right to edit any comments on this site and to read them on the air if they are extra-interesting. Please read the Comment Guidelines before posting.
You must be 13 or over to submit information to American Public Media. The information entered into this form will not be used to send unsolicited email and will not be sold to a third party. For more information see Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.