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Obama pushing bailout without solid plan in place
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| Contributor | Craverguy |
| Last Edited | Craverguy Jan 16, 2009 05:39pm |
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| Category | Opinion |
| News Date | Friday, January 16, 2009 11:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | The veto is the legislative equivalent of a nuclear warhead - a rarely used instrument of devastating force that singularly vaporizes the votes of 535 elected representatives. So when a president-elect issues a veto threat before being sworn into office, it sets off a particularly big explosion because it is a deliberate agenda-setting edict about priorities for the next four years.
That's why every American who isn't a financial industry executive should be nervous.
After President Bush this week asked Congress to release the bank bailout fund's remaining $350 billion, Obama pledged to veto any bill rejecting the request, meaning he is beginning his presidency not by "turn(ing) the page on policies that have put the greed and irresponsibility of Wall Street before the hard work and sacrifice of folks on Main Street," as he once pledged. Instead, he is promising a mushroom cloud unless lawmakers let taxpayer cash continue flowing to the biggest of Big Money interests.
Amid paeans to "new politics," we're watching old-school paybacks from a politician who raised more Wall Street dough than any other - a president-to-be whose inauguration festivities are being underwritten by the very bankers who are benefiting from the bailout largesse. Safely distanced from electoral pressure, Obama has appointed conservative economists to top White House positions; floated a tax cut for banks; and is now trying to preserve corporate welfare that almost exclusively benefits the political donor class.
This isn't much-ballyhooed "change" - it's money politics by a different name. How do we know? Because neither Obama nor anyone else is genuinely trying to justify the bailout on its merits - and understandably so. Even the most basic queries prove such merits don't exist. |
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