Earmarks Slipped Into $700bn Bailout Bill

If you look at it, this bill was apparently put together by Dems only, not a bipartisan effort and it’s not surprising that it’s so loaded down with crap it’s not funny. Dems love doing this, especially on fast-track bills that they want to force a vote on the same day. One has to read through their bills closely to see that you aren’t signing over your soul in the fine print. The plan is provide insufficient time for opposition to review. Looking at the body of the bill, as I interpret it:

1 page 9 line 23:
- The government has to buy loans at original sale price, not current market value. - Yeech
page 12 lines 6-11
- However, may adjust this to remaining principle owed. - A little better.
2 pages 9 line 24 through 10 line 3
- But is not required to buy if the company has already been merged or bought out by another company. That at least eliminate some of the transfers. - Okay fine
3 page 11 lines 13-24
- The treasure secretary can reset premium payments, term of loans, & interest rates. -Okay fine
4 page 14 lines 1-11
- This could be a loophole for exploitation by Acorn & bring them into play. All they would have to do to qualify is to transfer funds & property from it’s housing arm to reduce assets to under 1 mil. Pretty easy for them to accomplish.
5 page 16 lines 1-5
- There is a fraud clause. - Good
6 page 21 lines 3-9
- The Secretary can suggest to Congress that some financial market participants be subject to regulation. This was one of the problems with Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, they weren’t.
- The over-the-counter swap clause is a loophole that be abused to extend the bill’s expiration requirements.
7 page 23 line 16 through 24 line 6
- Another potential area of exploitation by the likes of Acorn.
8 page 26 line 18 through 27 line 2 & 28 line 23 through 29 line 3
- This allows renegotiation of loan terms by the borrower with Treasury Secretary approval. - Good but could be used to overflood the Treasury office with requests & bog down the system.
9 Section 124: page 28 line 20 & page 69 line 16 through
- Oh-oh. HOPE for homeowners amendment includes Acorn. I’m particularly concern over the language of page 70 line 8-15 where making payments can be considered payments in full. - A lot of people are outraged over this little addition. So Yes, Acorn crap is still in there but it isn’t as obvious as before.
10 page 31 line 16 through 32 line 11
- Eliminates “Golden parachutes” (Applies to only those given out AFTER the treasury takes over, doesn’t stop them if they bail now) & collection forcing senior (top 5) executives to return previously received bonuses (Only if they are proven inaccurately reported). - Loophole Alert.
11 Page 47
- Part of the fast-track includes the senate bill placing limitations on the house’s review process; can’t review it in committee and other non-sense.

It’s grandfathered only to loans that occured prior to March of this year. It incorporates either additional loan gaurantee insurance or buy-out, but Treasury decides which is more economical. There is oversight, but it isn’t only Congressional, which could have resulted in more corruption if it was Democrat majority or only like many commissions. The oversight committee reports monthly to Congress. It’s has an expiration clause, so it doesn’t create more big government. Includes transparency. The starting price is only $250 Billion, but allows president to bump this up by $350 Billion at any time by just informing Congress (Bush could do it immediately), and it can be boosted to the full $700 Billion with Congressional acceptance.

Overall I say kill this one too and wait to see what House can put together.

I agree with you Luva. And I would have like to see McCain vote against this bill. This bailout is one of the most stupid thing I have heard about. What do a politician know about Market and Economy? Zip… Zero! Let this problem in the hands of people who knows: Economists.

“When the government fails to pass a socialism bill and the market goes south, let it go south. For every person you hear saying this bailout is going to strengthen the market, it’s the exact opposite. The market’s not being allowed to work here because the losers haven’t been flushed out.” (Rush Limbaugh)

Read the rest here:
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_092908/content/01125100.guest.html

Two things:

There is no such thing as a “tax earmark”. At least until now they were just called tax breaks.

These were largely put in for the House Republicans. This is likely to rile the PAYGO wing of the House Democrats.

Strange days indeed.

I don’t know if there’s a list yet of which breaks are for who.

You could start by talking to this guy.

LINK

LINK

Okay, so all of these earmarks have been added, and we have a list of what these earmarks are. Where is the list of the Senators who added those earmarks? I want to know who, what, how much, and then why

Is there no list of who added what? Or is that hidden from us?

OK….So the congress of the United States doesn’t have the integrity to get the Bailout Bill right. Why not have another bill….A BALANCED BUDGET BILL WITH LINE ITEM VETO…..
The congress should be able to pass this in less than 48 hours…What do all Americans think???

Line item veto is the only way to bring back HONESTY to the congress….