knuckleheads

Congress was unable to vote this dog into law. I am vaguely surprised. But not too shocked. Congressional Reps have to answer to voters back home in an election year. Too much support for this hugely unpopular bailout, and your opponent suddenly has you by the unmentionables. Instant election loss.

You see, the media have been too good at blaming all evil on the "Fat Cats" of Wall Street. And Wall Street types have been too good at flaunting their wealth in the faces of people who work just as hard as they do, just without the unbelievable rewards. So any legislation that is seen as bailing out Wall Street cannot be good ... and it is ironic that this bailout is supported by the Democrats, who have spent so long in trying to smear the finance world -- while taking the lion's share of the PAC funds from Wall Street execs. It smacks of reaping what you sow.

But a bailout is consistent with Democratic tenets: big government is good, and the they want to be the ones pulling the levers. The self-mutilating vote of the Republicans is also true to form: keep government out of it. And as stated before, Republicans repeated tried to rein in Fannie and Freddie -- exercising a regulatory role, and Democrats squashed such attempts. It is all so topsy-turvey.

So where do we go from here? Asia and Europe will poop the bed as their markets open and the impact of this failure is felt. The U.S. will likely further soil itself tomorrow -- Happy New Year to those of the Tribe -- and.... Who knows? My guess is that the whole mess will be put to a vote again on Thursday (perhaps Weds.) and will pass: the holdouts will be able to point and say that they resisted, but the risk of doing the "right thing" was too great.

What is also clear is that the hits to the global equity markets are also providing excellent buying opportunities -- "once in a lifetime" deals -- for many of the cash rich banks out there. As stock prices drop, watch for a slew of hostile takeovers. Bet on it. Want someplace safe to stash some money? Banco Santander and Barclays still look good. French banks just scare me.

I have got to say that on one level, I really feel bad for those who are trying to keep their houses, working two jobs to pay the mortgage and watching the whole mess slip away through no fault of their own. Those people are crazy mad at the banks that lent them the money ... ignoring that they asked for it in the first place ... and don't want to see them benefit. What is simply too arcane for most people in the streets of the US of A is that the bailout isn't what it seems, and that the failure to do so -- help the Fat Cats -- is going to cost them their houses and likely their jobs.