News: Bailout Vote
Congress is poised to vote on the biggest government intervention in the financial markets since the Great Depression, but it’s unlikely that any of the three senators vying for the White House will be there — even though all three have talked of little else for over a week.
“While it creates a gimmicky $700 billion installment plan, attempts to improve transparency, and has new provisions cloaked as taxpayer protections, its net effect is still a huge bailout of the financial sector that will snuff out the free market system,” said Representative Connie Mack, Republican of Florida.
President Bush joined key supporters of a Wall Street bailout package today, prodding lawmakers to approve the plan, hours ahead of a difficult House vote expected later in the day.
Indeed, the Senate bailout vote could fall on Friday, creating a huge logistical headache for both candidates even to make sure they’re onstage when the curtain goes up at Ole Miss.
Congress is poised to vote on the biggest government intervention in the financial markets since the Great Depression, but it’s unlikely that any of the three senators vying for the White House will be there – even though all three have talked of little else for over a week.
“I was disappointed in the vote with the United States Congress on the economic rescue plan,” he told reporters during a picture-taking session with the president of Ukraine.
Late Sunday afternoon, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid held a news conference with Senate Banking Committee chairman Chris Dodd to announce that Congress would vote quickly on the legislation.
Indeed, the Senate bailout vote could fall on Friday itself, creating a huge logistical headache for both candidates even to make sure they’re on stage when the curtain goes up at Ole Miss.
Sen. John McCain has no plans to return to Washington this week, even though on Monday he expressed discomfort with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson ’s trillion-dollar bailout plan and has offered his own rescue proposal.
One, Representative Jim Marshall, a Georgia Democrat facing a re-election contest, told his colleagues in their private meeting that he would vote for the measure to bolster the economy.
On Wednesday, McCain contradicted Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who said the Republican presidential hopeful would support the bailout.
In a stunning vote that shocked the capital and worldwide markets, the House on Monday defeated a $700 billion emergency rescue for the nation’s financial system, ignoring urgent warnings from President Bush and congressional leaders of both parties that the economy could nosedive.
Arizona Sen. John McCain has no plans to return to Washington this week, even though on Monday he expressed discomfort with Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s trillion-dollar bailout plan and has offered his own rescue proposal.
The fate of the rescue package remained in doubt as Democrats and Republicans both said they wanted to resurrect it.
Obama, meanwhile, said “the power to spend $700 billion of taxpayers’ money cannot be left up to the discretion of one man, no matter who he is or which party he is from.
Neither Obama nor McCain returned to Capitol Hill for an important economic vote on July 26, when the Senate passed a massive housing bill to shore up mortgage markets and prevent hundreds of thousands of foreclosures.
House leaders say they’re reconvening Thursday instead of adjourning for the year as planned, after dealing the bailout a stunning defeat.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, center, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, announcing in Washington a tentative deal on a $700 billion rescue of the financial sector.
Senior Obama strategist Robert Gibbs said the campaign would also be monitoring the process as it unfolds, but as of Monday, the campaign would not commit to Obama’s making the trip back to Washington — even though the bailout proposal has taken a central role in Democratic presidential nominee’s stump speeches.
“Inaction would paralyze our economy,” Reid said.
