Money, its a gas. Grab that cash with both hands and make a stash.

Why the rush to bailout failures?

Let's do some numbers:

A $1.8 Trillion Bailout: Where the Money's Going

Following are details of actions, proposals and amounts:

—Up to $700 billion to buy assets from struggling institutions. The plan is aimed at sopping up residential and commercial mortgages from financial institutions but gives Treasury broad latitude.

—Up to $50 billion from the Great Depression-era Exchange Stabilization Fund to guarantee principal in money market mutual funds to provide the same confidence that consumers have in federally insured bank deposits.

—The Fed committed to make unspecified discount window loans to financial institutions to finance the purchase of assets from money market funds to aid redemptions.

—At least $10 billion in Treasury direct purchases of mortgage-backed securities in September. In doubling the program on Friday, the Treasury said it may purchase even more in the months ahead.

—Up to $144 billion in additional MBS purchases by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.The Treasury announced they would increase purchases up to the newly expanded investment portfolio limits of $850 billion each. On July 30, the Fannie portfolio stood at $758.1 billion with Freddie's at $798.2 billion.

—$85 billion loan for AIG, which would give the Federal government a 79.9 percent stake and avoid a bankruptcy filing for the embattled insurer.

—At least $87 billion in repayments to JPMorgan Chase for providing financing to underpin trades with units of bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers. Paulson said over the weekend he was adamant that public funds not be used to rescue the firm.

—$200 billion for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The Treasury will inject up to $100 billion into each institution by purchasing preferred stock to shore up their capital as needed.

—$300 billion for the Federal Housing Administration to refinance failing mortgage into new, reduced-principal loans with a federal guarantee, passed as part of a broad housing rescue bill.

—$4 billion in grants to local communities to help them buy and repair homes abandoned due to mortgage foreclosures.

—$29 billion in financing for JPMorgan Chase's government-brokered buyout of Bear Stearns in March. The Fed agreed to take $30 billion in questionable Bear assets as collateral, making JPMorgan liable for the first $1 billion in losses, while agreeing to shoulder any further losses.

—At least $200 billion of currently outstanding loans to banks issued through the Fed's Term Auction Facility, which was recently expanded to allow for longer loans of 84 days alongside the previous 28-day credits.

1.8 TRILLION dollars! That's a one and an eight trailed by a parade of zeros, (loan) floats, (lax) standard bearers and hot air gas bags.
But what do the numbers really mean? Here's an excellent synopsis via AMERICAblog:

What is $500 billion? What's a trillion?

A reader asked what any of the bailout numbers represent in the real world. We know $500 billion, $700 billion or now the new Paulson plan of $1.8 trillion is a lot, but put this in terms that everyone can understand. A few examples for 2007:

* Microsoft generated $51 billion in revenue.
* Citi, who has been hit hard in the credit crisis, saw $159 billion.
* Walmart's 2007 total revenue was $388 billion.
* ExxonMobil generated $404 billion.

Those are the numbers for some of the largest businesses in the US. For the US budget, here are a few examples from Bush's budget in 2007:

* Veterans' benefits at $73 billion
* Education was $90 billion
* Interest on US debt was $244 billion
* Medicare $395 billion
* Defense was $548 billion
* Social Security was $586

In total, the 2007 federal budget was a total of $2.8 trillion.

Here's a slide show of what 700 BILLION dollars buys:What Does $700 Billion Actually Buy?

And John McCain is shocked, shocked I tell you, that John McCain's campaign advisers and transition team are filled with lobbyists for the banking industry ... oops sorry, John McCain is outraged that American taxpayers would bailout these failing companies ... until he was outraged that American taxpayers wouldn't bailout these failed companies, and then he's ... what!?

"We cannot have the taxpayers bail out AIG or anybody else."
[...]
"We've got to get a more coordinated and a much more stringent oversight regime,"
[...]
"Government can play a very, very appropriate role in the oversight."

But wait, there's more!

Republican Sen. John McCain said he would suspend campaigning to help tackle a $700 billion bailout proposal

Well sure, if by 'suspend campaign' you mean going on talk shows, having your surrogates on every media outlet bragging about how you 'suspended' campaigning and continuing to raise funds and run campaign commercials:

McCain to do round of network interviews tonight

John McCain will appear on all three network newscasts tonight, a top aide said.

McCain is at the White House meeting with President Bush, Barack Obama and congressional leaders now and will tape interviews with NBC, ABC and CBS after the West Wing session.

McCain also appeared in a taped interview last night with Katie Couric on CBS.

We can debate about whether the 700 BILLION Dollar bailout is a good idea, but what is not debatable is the fact that the house and senate, republicans and democrats and the actual congressional committees involved had worked out a plan they could agree on ... until McCain sang "Here I am to save the day!" and derailed the whole process, about which he knows nothing and isn't on any relevant committees:

House GOP Aides: McCain ‘Not Familiar With The Details’ Of The Financial Bailout

BTW, that's the Senator John McCain who has been absent on more votes than any other senator.

His posturing to suddenly seem 'presidential' doesn't seem to be working, even with all the outside help he's being given:

Maliki Suggests Bush Pushed To Extend U.S. Presence In Iraq To Help McCain

Actually, the final date was really the end of 2010 and the period between the end of 2010 and the end of 2011 was for withdrawing the remaining troops from all of Iraq, but they asked for a change [in date] due to political circumstances related to the [U.S] domestic situation so it will not be said to the end of 2010 followed by one year for withdrawal but the end of 2011 as a final date.

We've learned over the last 7 years that there is no low that a rethuglican who wants to gain or keep office will stoop to.

Congrats to John McSame for lowering himself to a new low.



Cross posted at VidiotSpeak