told NPR’s Melissa Block

I think that [U.S. Treasury] Secretary [Henry] Paulson has shown almost no understanding of how a democracy operates. His initial draft would have given him $700 billion of your tax money with no oversight, no judicial review, no accountability. I mean, we’re not a dictatorship.

Read the interview here. Don’t think all will be made well by the elections. Whatever measures are enacted to end this crisis and whatever powers are given to the Treasury or the Federal Reserve will not be easily taken back no matter who is elected. Granted this is a crisis situation, something must be done now, not after January when the executive baton is passed and new legislators take their seats. But the nation will deal with the consequences long after January 2008.
If my tax money is investing in these companies, then I have some questions.
1. Didn’t we just bail out a bunch of Savings and Loans? What did we get out of that and why didn’t we do something then to make sure the financial sector wouldn’t be reaching in my pocket again?
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3. If we lend them money now, when are they going to pay us back and will be be at an interest rate comparable to what the financial sector is charging me on my credit cards, student loans, home loans, or car loans? Or if we are buying a stake in the company at above market value, do we have guarantees that they will buy the stake back at a comparable rate?
4. What kind of oversight will there be on who gets what funds from the Treasury? Are we supposed to just trust them to pick the most important ones to save?
5. How will we make sure the companies are well managed so that they can emerge from the current crisis? Don’t you ask a lot of questions when you invest your own funds? And we all hate paying unnecessary taxes. So do yourself a favor as a taxpayer. Pay attention to this thing for a moment. Demand oversight. Demand a return on taxpayer funds. Demand regulations to prevent this from happening again. Demand accountability. For an interesting and hilarious take on the whole thing to take the edge off, you really ought to check out The Daily Show’s analysis of the “brilliant plan,” as American as apple pie! When the Daily Show reports on stories like this you laugh and you cry, and you do both at the same time. Because they point out the absurdity of the situation and the disastrous policies, which would send any normal person into a pit of despair. But they do it with such brilliant wit, you can’t help but laugh. ]]>