Am I wrong here? I thought Paulson was going to buy preferred stocks when they passed TARP. That would not be the same as buying troubled assets. But that leaves the question, why did they accept Bush's tiny and seemingly inconsequential change in the first place?

Why does Obama think that the pigs of the GOP will suddenly play nice and work for the common good of the United States?

The loophole was that limits on exec compensation applied only to firms who sold troubled assets to the Troubled Assets plan. The folks who designed the plan (and the loophole) apparently knew from the start that it wasn't about buying troubled assets at all. It was about injecting capital to every bank on Wall Street regardless of need.

We ought to have laws to cover this kind of thing, but we didn't. We wrote a blank check to Wall Street, and told Treasury: spend it any way you'd like. The bill did include an oversight board, but Sen Bunning but a hold on the overseer, so Paulson got to write $335 billion in checks to his Wall Street pals without any oversight at all.

Remind me again why the auto companies have to have a detailed plan and turn their companies upside-down to qualify for 1/40th of this amount?!

It was reasonable in the beginning for the Democrats to trust their opponents, but, after so long a time, doesn't it seem like they should know better by now? And hopefully the Dems have noticed that reppublican senators have put them on notice that they have no intention of cooperating and that bipartisanship is not in their plans.

In the nearly eight years Bush and his cronies have been in power have they ever done anything that didn't turn into a mongolian cluster fuck? Why should we be surprised at they're handling this.

If I recall correctly, there is a law against lying to Congress; if one isn't under oath, it's not perjury, but it's still a crime.

My thoughts and prayers are with the poor Democrats who with good intentions have helped the Republicans pas the Patriot Act, Military Commissions act, start two wars, and destroy the economy. Two shoes up for the Democrats! They have been spineless enablers of the Bush regimes but they are the good guys.

This is one of my favorite blogs but geeeez, you guys sure let the Democrats off easy.

Bushco: "The world will come to an end if you don't let us loot the Treasury!"
Democrats: "Are you sure that the world will come to and end?"
Bushco: "Armageddon!"
Democrats: "That's what you said when you wanted to invade Iraq."
Bushco: "This time it's different."
Democrats: "Okay, loot the Treasury."

Bushco is a pack of villains to be sure. Congressional Democrats were their willing enablers in this instance.

Reid has lost so many battles of this kind to Bush that I'm beginning to wonder whether it is deliberate. The man can't be as stupid as he appears; he must want to lose many of these battles, perhaps to please campaign contributors.

When a Republiscum promises to be bipartisan, he means, "we won't filibuster the lunch order."

Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice....we won't get fooled again.

The Democrats are culpable. They aren't that dumb nor that gullible. They are having their cake and eating it too. Getting to huff and puff against Bush and republicans while rewarding their corporate masters.

Money is bipartisan.

"Schmuck" is just another name for Congressional Democrat.

From Truth Progress: This says it all about the Democrats. Just reverse the words Democrats and Republicans as you read this and it would be unbelievable. But it's believable and characteristic when the Dems act spineless. I loathe the Republicans but harbor great contempt for the Democrats.

"Responding to GOP complaints, Leahy reschedules Holder hearing.»

In recent weeks, GOP senators have been balking over the scheduled Jan. 8 confirmation hearings for Eric Holder, President-elect Obama’s nominee for attorney general. Following the lead of Karl Rove, these senators have been claiming that they need more time to prepare their attacks on Holder. Today, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) announced that he has decided to postpone the hearings one week until Jan. 15:

The Committee has not yet received the names of other designees for high-ranking Department of Justice officials that we had anticipated and more time is now available to the Judiciary Committee. Therefore, to accommodate the Republicans on the Judiciary Committee, at their request we are delaying the hearing, again, until January 15. The Assistant Republican Leader said last year that ‘attorney general nominees have been confirmed, on average, in approximately three weeks.’

Nonetheless, in order to accommodate the Republicans members, I am rescheduling the hearing on Mr. Holder for twice that long, until more than six weeks after his official designation. It is disappointing to me that they are insisting that we delay at a time when the nation needs its top law enforcement officer and national security team in place and working. I trust that with this additional time to prepare, they will cooperate in proceeding promptly to Committee and Senate consideration of the historic Holder nomination as Democrats did for President Bush."

Joe Buck on December 15, 2008 at 2:27 PM

The man [Reid] can't be as stupid as he appears; he must want to lose many of these battles, perhaps to please campaign contributors.

I remember looking at the photo op of Bush and Paulson the day the bailout was announced and they looked way too happy to trust that the right thing was done.

Some things should be taxed at 100% - Executive Bonuses paid with bailout funds, for instance.

On the other side of the fence: the democrats haven't gone into recess in almost 2 years, which is precisely because Bush abused recess appointments so drastically.

Given that Bush has ignored direct language that he doesn't like, and that he has invented executive rights out of whole cloth, it's hard to see what the Democrats could have done other than impeach the criminal. And since more than a third of the Senate was willing to follow Bush off a cliff that wasn't going to happen. All of this hate on the Congressional Democrats appears to completely discount the degree to which they were dealing with a lawless president and a lawless republican party.

Again, as I commented on Steve's morning post, this is a NON-story.

As I blogged when the bailout was passed, specific executive perks that were contractually guaranteed couldn't be touched anyway, and as most executive perks ARE contractually guaranteed, this was smoke and mirrors, a dog and pony show or whatever you want to call it.

Note what Grassley himself said:
"The flimsy executive-compensation restrictions in the original bill are now all but gone."

It WAS a story, or should have been, two months ago, but much of the media -- and much of the blogworld, both "liberal" and "conservative" -- missed covering the fact that most "executive haircuts" could not actually be done, legally.

I loathe the Republicans but harbor great contempt for the Democrats.

I couldn't agree more.

Policy makers have been confronted with crises, Dems have come to the table with good intentions and a willingness to trust their rivals, and it just never worked out for them.

That's been obvious since Bush was appointed.

What has not been similarly obvious is that the Repubs, recognizing the current financial crisis, have come to the table with similar good intentions for America and trust in their rivals.

Instead the Republicans are all out to see what they can get for themselves and the Republican Party out of the current set of crises, and they are happily obstructing every proposal until they come out ahead of everyone else.

The impeachment of Bill Clinton really did poison the well in Washington (symptom or cause?), but only the Democrats have made any real efforts to bring in fresh water since then, and every effort has resulted in Republican treachery.

When all this was happening, liberal economists (Krugman, DeLong, Stiglitz, etc.) said that the administration plan to buy troubled assets was terrible and that the money should be used to buy stock in the banks. Paulsen said he did not want to go that route but the authority to do so was put in the bill anyway at the insistence of the Democrats. Why would we now whine about getting our way just because King Henry was lying to Congress which probably won votes more from the Republicans than from Democrats? I never wanted to use the money to buy bad loans at inflated prices but instead wanted equity in the banks that took federal funds. The fact that this administration is a bunch of crooks certainly doesn't surprise me, but I am happy they used the money in a better fashion that originally planned.

The relationship between Lucy and Charlie Brown keeps coming to mind

As it should.

Why did Charles Schultz repeatedly return to Lucy, Charlie Brown and the football? And more important what did that episode become iconic in American culture? Because it certainly has. It says something important about the American culture.

The problem is that Charlie Brown wanted to play football, and had to have Lucy's cooperation in order to do it. Lucy had other goals - demonstrating Charlie Brown's ineptitude and her superiority over him.

Why does Charlie Brown keep coming back? Because he still wants to play football and has to trust Lucy to do it.

I think the similar dynamic between Republicans and Democrats is that Democrats want a well-run effective government because our society cannot exist without it, and they have to trust the Republicans to get it. Just as Lucy doesn't give a damn about football, the Republicans don't give a damn about good government. Their goals are much more parochial. But they still have to be involved in any effective government.

So to get good government, the Democrats have to keep trying to trust the Republicans.

The result is clear. Snoop Hogg wrote it.

I loathe the Republicans but harbor great contempt for the Democrats.

That interaction grows out of the core of the schizo American culture and in particular out of the conflicting cultures of the "Two Tribes" that Digby has written about.

"...Dems have come to the table with good intentions and a willingness to trust their rivals, and it just never worked out for them..."-Benen

Why do you continuously describe the despicable, diabolical tactics of the obstructionist party and its mass murdering leader so graciously as in ..."it just never worked out for them..." rather than POP just bought, threatened or bribed a few of their members, while sneaking in different provisions and using signing statements etc or "whatever it took no matter the legality" to get their way. After having turned our economy into a disaster only to use disaster capitalism to gain control and bust unions apart, the People's Obstructionist Party (POP) has only one mission...to protect the holdings and the business of the wealthy and multinational corporations, using the filibuster to obstruct legislating by the majority or any change initiated by democrats or liberals (many DINOs and BLUE DICKS are of the same conservative money party mind). They deserve no respect or honor or place in our government. The nation polls liberal and our leaders do almost the opposite of what the people demand always deciding for us rather than with us.
Like the rest of their tactics their past success will not continue in this future. Americans got a good look and overwhelmingly said "no more...enough". Somehow we will rid ourselves of these leaders also as we denazify our government.

I'm not ready to play nice with these liars and certainly they deserve no respect after having supported mass murder and torture and putting the middle class our of work while destroying the environment. Too serious to play nice.