Is anyone actually in favor of the bail out?

I personally think that we should just let the banks fail and not save their greedy banker butts. It seems like that's the way a lot of other people feel too. I haven't heard one person say let's save their greedy banker butts. However, I'm pretty sure that congress will bail them out. If I could vote on this, I would definitely say no, no matter what consequence to myself (drop in stock, retirement and possibly the value of my home, no loan for college next semester).

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See! We bail out the big guys and the money goes straight to the CEOs that ran the company into the ground, rewarding their incompetence! Oh, lets hurry and bail out the automakers too!

WASHINGTON - American International Group is paying out millions of dollars in executive bonuses to meet a Sunday deadline. But the troubled insurance giant has agreed to administration demands to restrain future payments.

The Treasury Department determined that the government did not have the legal authority to block the current payments by the company that has already received more than $170 billion in U.S. support.

AIG declared earlier this month that it had suffered a loss of $61.7 billion for the fourth quarter of last year, the largest corporate loss in history.

Just wondered what everyone thinks about this subject. I haven't seen it discussed yet and if it has been sorry. Do you think the government should bail out these two institutions and if so, or not so, why?

I heard someone on the TV today (didn't recognize the name but he's an idependent) he asked the question, so is it going to be the people who make $30K a year the ones who pay for this or the billionaires and trillionaires? I thought that was a good point.

Also I heard that one of the guys in charge (forget his name right now) made over $90 million and he isn't paying anything. I would think that if you make over $90M on this and you run it into the ground you should have to forfeit whatever you made and pay it back (but that's my own opinion).

to put money back into the market. If we do nothing at all, the result is likely to be horrific. We have to do something to get money back into the market. However, bailing out these big banks and making us foot the bill is unacceptable to me. These banks and their big wigs should learn the consequences of their actions and not just walk away with a heck of a lot more money than I will ever see in my lifetime. This initial bail out is just a band-aid really. Our economy is collapsing and this bail out will slow down the collapse but there is no guarantee that it will stop it.

Right now they are debating about how to go about this bail out. Some want the bail out left like it is with us taxpayers footing the bill. Others are trying to come up with a plan to not make the burden on us and yet still get money into the market. That is why no agreement has been made.

what have they learned. They obviously won't have any consequences to their actions. We will be the ones to suffer for their greed and crimes. However, what is to become of us if we don't bail them out? I really don't know the answer to this. I am just thoroughly ticked off that our government has allowed things to get like this. Now they are sitting around crying and whining, pointing fingers, wanting special interests included in the bill, etc. I'm just so disgusted.

Read the following report. 8-10% of total cost doesn't seem like a huge percentage for labor costs. Maybe they can't afford the big salaries and bonuses for the top dogs? About time the wealth started being redistributed. Funny I haven't heard any outrage over the outrageous salaries the top dogs in these automobile business are paid. Just whining about how much the UAW workers are paid. It's about time the working class started standing up for the working class!!!!!

Let 'em all go bankrupt. I have no doubt the idjits in Washington are way more concerned about job losses in "developing countries" than those of American citizens.

I personally think that all candidates should be subjected to a polygraph. This way we won't have to dig through all the BS all the politicians give us and we know whether they are lying or not. LOL! Kind of like our own political BS detector.

there were no exemptions whatsoever. If, say you earned a dollar, you owed a dime. No exceptions regarding where the money comes from. Tax welfare benefits too. Social Security is already taxed for some recipients. Those of us who receive Social Security and have enough income to pay taxes on 85% (maximum) of it ALL had the opportunity for a better life. Some took advantage of that and some didn't. Young people today have little hope of receiving Social Security and they also have little hope of being able to live while saving for their future.

Report Accuses EPA of Slanting Analysis
Hill
Researchers Say Agency Fixed Pollution Study to Favor Bush's 'Clear
Skies'

By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday,
December 3, 2005; A08

The Bush administration skewed its analysis of pending legislation on air
pollution to favor its bill over two competing proposals, according to a new
report by the Congressional Research Service.

The Environmental Protection Agency's Oct. 27 analysis of its plan -- along
with those of Sens. Thomas R. Carper (D-Del.) and James M. Jeffords (I-Vt.) --
exaggerated the costs and underestimated the benefits of imposing more stringent
pollution curbs, the independent, nonpartisan congressional researchers wrote in
a Nov. 23 report. The EPA issued its analysis -- which Carper had demanded this
spring, threatening to hold up the nomination of EPA Administrator Stephen L.
Johnson -- in part to revive its proposal, which is stalled in the Senate.

The administration's Clear Skies legislation aims to achieve a 70 percent cut
in emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide after 2018, while Carper's and
Jeffords's bills demand steeper and faster cuts and would also reduce emissions
of carbon dioxide, which are linked to global warming. The Bush plan would also
cut emissions of neurotoxic mercury by 70 percent, while Jeffords's bill reduces
them by 90 percent.

Although it represents a step toward understanding the impacts of legislative
options, EPA's analysis is not as useful as one could hope, the Research Service
report said. The result is an analysis that some will argue is no longer
sufficiently up-to-date to contribute substantially to congressional debate.

The congressional report, which was not commissioned by a lawmaker as is
customary, said the EPA analysis boosted its own proposal by overestimating the
cost of controlling mercury and playing down the economic benefits of reducing
premature deaths and illnesses linked to air pollution.

EPA estimated the administration's plan would cost coal-fired power plants as
much as $6 billion annually, compared with up to $10 billion in Carper's measure
and as much as $51 billion for Jeffords's. It calculated that Bush's proposal
would produce $143 billion a year in health benefits while Carper's would
generate $161 billion and Jeffords would yield $211 billion. Carper's measure
would achieve most of its reductions by 2013, while Jeffords's bill would enact
even more ambitious pollution cuts by 2010.

EPA spokeswoman Eryn Witcher said the agency based its cost estimates on
mercury controls by gathering comments from boilermaker workers, power companies
and emission control companies, whereas the Research Service used a single study
to reach its conclusions on mercury.

Clear Skies delivers dramatic health benefits across the nation without
raising energy costs and does it with certainty and simplicity, instead of
regulation and litigation, Witcher said. Because of our commitment to see this
become a reality, EPA went above and beyond to provide the most comprehensive
legislative analysis of air ever prepared by the agency, so it does a real
disservice to this discussion to have a report that largely ignores and
misinterprets our analysis.

But aides to Carper and Jeffords said they felt vindicated by the
congressional study.

The CRS report backs up a lot of what we initially said about EPA's latest
analysis, that it overstated the costs of controlling mercury and understated
the overall health benefits of Senator Carper's legislation, said Carper
spokesman Bill Ghent. The report clearly states that there's no reason to settle
for the president's Clear Skies plan because the legislation doesn't clean the
air much better than current law.

� 2005 The Washington Post
Company

On January 5, 2006, Congressman Murtha held a town hall meeting with Cong. Jim Moran (D-VA 08).

The soldier who asked the first question served in Afghanistan and said that morale among troops is high and that he would gladly serve in Iraq today. His comment was the only one replayed by Fox News the next day.

But the majority of soldiers in attendance spoke out against the current policy. Fox News did not broadcast their remarks.

Garin Reppenhagen, served as a sniper in Iraq for a year in the First Infantry Division: