It’s Just A Complicated Game

I’ve been mostly silent on the financial bailout plan because mostly, I don’t understand it. And usually, when you’re ignorant about something, it’s better not to broadcast that fact.

However, as with most political blogs, displaying my ignorance is pretty much what I do here at the World’s Most Dangerous Political Blog ™. So here we go!

I’ve always thought of high finance as a big shell game, a kind of semi-religious con that is basically moving lots of numbers around to the benefit of those who pretend to know what the numbers mean. And when I hear, as I have constantly in the past week, that nobody really understands exactly what’s going on, or that the $700 billion number was pulled out of Henry Paulson’s Fannie Mae, or that no one is exactly sure that the bailout will really work, it makes me think that my—admittedly cynical—take might be right.

But let’s assume that a bailout really is needed. Enough smart people are saying that that I am willing to accept the premise.

The problem that faces us is, apparently, that the majority of Americans are, like me, very dubious about this fix. And in an election year, a lot of congress people are just not willing to go against their constituents and vote for this unpopular bill.

It seems to me that some sort of compromise could be found. Say, a bill that provides some security blanket to Wall Street, that doesn’t lock in another huge debt to the taxpayer, that doesn’t give too much authority to Paulsen, that basically says – “here’s what’s needed to tide us over ‘till after the election” —when the new President and Congress came take this on in a less panicked, politically-charged atmosphere.

Now, that may be kicking the can down the road, and maybe we don’t have that luxury. I simply don’t know.

What I do know is that neither of the two candidates seem to be willing to go very far in suggesting fixes, which, given the calendar, is not surprising. It’s annoying to see McCain flailing around on this, but to be honest, I’m not impressed with Obama’s kind of hands-off approach either.

I know he’s put forward a few suggestions. But mostly, I think he’s content to bash McCain and Republican mismanagement. It’s probably good politics. I personally would like to get beyond that, but I’m not always realistic about these things.

I would now like to formally apologize for wasting three-and-a-half minutes of your time.

Carry on.