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Go Home Want An Interesting Debate? Update: Bill Failing

SEPTEMBER 29, 2008

Want An Interesting Debate? Update: Bill Failing

BY EVE FAIRBANKS

The House debate on the bailout bill, just concluding now before the final vote, was the most striking House debate I've ever seen. Because both sides are hemorrhaging votes, it didn't have the usual strictly partisan back-and-forth quality usually found in the House. Republicans lauded Barney Frank for his "noble" work; Steny Hoyer quoted Spiro Agnew to speak in support of the bill. It was -- wonder of wonders -- practically a real debate, rare as a blue moon in the people's chamber. With a tough election consuming everybody's thoughts, the argument centered as much around the job definition for a congressman as on the actual details of the bailout plan. The bill sucks, everybody acknowledged, but is it better in principle to act or not to act? Do voters send congressmen to the House to enact things, or to stand athwart very imperfect progress? Will the 110th Congress shortly be punished for its partisan bickering and incapacity to pass big reforms?

"This bill is the wrong medicine," insisted moderate Democrat Marcy Kaptur. "I say we go back to the drawing board."

"This will be the most difficult decision I make in my sixteen years in this body," countered a mournful Spencer Bachus, the top Republican on the Finance Committee. "None of us in this body have any good judgment or insight into what it means if we don't pass the bill." 

"Meeting a national crisis does not give anybody the luxury to do everything they want," pleaded Barney Frank.

The weirdest case in favor the bill came from Minority Leader John Boehner, who yesterday called the bill a "crap sandwich." "Nobody wants to vote for this," he yelled. "Nobody wants to be anywhere near it. ... You all know how awful it is. I didn't come here to vote for bills like this!" But, he went on, "I believe the risk in not acting is much higher. ... These are the votes that separate the men from the boys and the girls from the women. What's in the best interest of our country? Vote yes," he concluded and dashed away from the podium in tears.

Update: Chaos on the House floor. Opponents of the bill are screaming for the vote to be closed. Wow -- the bailout bill looks to be on the verge of failing, with more Democratic "nos" than I'd have expected. Supporters of the bill need eleven votes changed to rescue it right now.

--Eve Fairbanks

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13 comments

Oh yea get down there Dow!

Eh...I mean, terrible, terrible thing that vote.

- The Ignorant Populist

September 29, 2008 at 1:52pm

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Yep, just watched the tally on CNN, who was getting some live vote feed from C-Span. As of about 10 min. ago, 220 in the House had voted against. Back to the drawing board?

- satyendra

September 29, 2008 at 2:02pm

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Good, make the Republicans step up, they created this mess let them eat it. Keep this issue on the front burned until Nov. The world will survive until then, and then after Obama is elected let the Dems pass it.

- blackton

September 29, 2008 at 2:11pm

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I still don't understand why, if the economy needs business investment capital, the government just doesn't loan banks investment capital contingent on them using it for business investment capital.  

- Lymon1

September 29, 2008 at 2:15pm

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I don't mind them spending more time on this, and I can't see them passing nothing at all, but: Eggheads, how long do they/we have before the worldwide depression clobbers us?  I prefer not to crap my pants until I absolutely have to. When would that be? Thx!

- psantillana

September 29, 2008 at 2:18pm

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Seriously?  Boehner was in tears?  

Apparently the Republican-brand identity crisis is more sweeping than we realized.

- dylanposer

September 29, 2008 at 2:19pm

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Sounds more like the Knesset than Congress. Utter chaos.

- rozenson

September 29, 2008 at 2:28pm

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"The US political class sucks, everybody acknowledged, but is it better in principle to vote for US political class or not to vote for the US political class?

"Do voters send the US political class to serve the nation or to create slush funds that benefit themselves, Goldman Sachs, and their respective identity-politics pets?

"Will the US political class shortly be punished for its massive failure to pursue a sensible economic strategy, its corruption and gross incompetence?"

Good questions, Eve. Time for a new political class. A pox on both your f***ing fetid houses. No rule by Goldman Sachs. No more Fannie/Fred pinatas to be raided by both parties. No more of this asinine bread-and-circus policy of shoveling credit at low-income people who haven't a prayer of ever repaying it.

- teplukhin2you

September 29, 2008 at 2:30pm

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Iggy - buy $$$.

Remember me when you're rich and famous

- teplukhin2you

September 29, 2008 at 2:30pm

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Has anyone heard from the Maverick? Time for him, Bush, Gingrich and the rest of the 1% club to take a stab at it. Barney couldn't do it. Let's see what the right comes up with. Has anyone heard from Rush?

- fougasseu

September 29, 2008 at 2:40pm

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Just got lucky Tep. Had my SL up to break even and stuck on CNN.

What happens now? Can the WH make them vote again on the same bill? Or do they have to  renegotiate a new bill?

If they do have to go back to the drawing board, then it could drag out for days, weeks. Couldn't it?

Obama just said he'd review the entire plan in office! Makes me believe his heart wasn't in the original plan.

The market's not going to like that.

- The Ignorant Populist

September 29, 2008 at 2:48pm

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Speaking of corruption and incompetence, we interrupt this painful non-fiction with a dose of reality from the world of fiction:

www.abc.net.au/.../heller.htm

It really is a Heller moment.

- fougasseu

September 29, 2008 at 2:58pm

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Sell the Grand Canyon to Saudi Arabia for $300 billion.  Next problem?  

- Lymon1

September 29, 2008 at 2:59pm

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