So far this is the only "bail out" proposal I have seen that actually has a chance of making things better without hurting us more in the long run. Everyone should sign it/copy it and either mail or or email it (or hell call their office and read it word for word to them) to the representatives.

http://www.daveramsey.com/media/pdf/..._sense_fix.pdf

The Common Sense Fix
Years of bad decisions and stupid mistakes have created an economic nightmare in this country, but $700 billion in new debt is not the answer. As a tax-paying American citizen, I will not support any congressperson who votes to implement such a policy. Instead, I submit the following threestep

Common Sense Plan.
I. INSURANCE

a. Insure the subprime bonds/mortgages with an underlying FHA-type insurance.
Government-insured and backed loans would have an instant market all over the
world, creating immediate and needed liquidity.

b. In order for a company to accept the government-backed insurance, they must do two
things:

1. Rewrite any mortgage that is more than three months delinquent to a 6% fixed-rate mortgage.

a. Roll all back payments with no late fees or legal costs into the balance. This brings homeowners current and allows them a chance to keep their homes.

b. Cancel all prepayment penalties to encourage refinancing or the sale of the property to pay off the bad loan. In the event of foreclosure or short sale, the borrower will not be held liable for any deficit balance. FHA does this now, and that encourages mortgage companies to go the extra mile while working with the borrower—again limiting foreclosures and ruined lives.

2. Cancel ALL golden parachutes of EXISTING and FUTURE CEOs and executive team members as long as the company holds these government-insured bonds/mortgages. This keeps underperforming executives from being paid when they don’t do their jobs.

c. This backstop will cost less than $50 billion—a small fraction of the current proposal.

II. MARK TO MARKET

a. Remove mark to market accounting rules for two years on only subprime Tier III
bonds/mortgages. This keeps companies from being forced to artificially mark down bonds/mortgages below the value of the underlying mortgages and real estate.

b. This move creates patience in the market and has an immediate stabilizing effect on
failing and ailing banks—and it costs the taxpayer nothing.

III. CAPITAL GAINS TAX

a. Remove the capital gains tax completely. Investors will flood the real estate and stock
market in search of tax-free profits, creating tremendous—and immediate—liquidity in the markets. Again, this costs the taxpayer nothing.

b. This move will be seen as a lightning rod politically because many will say it is helping
the rich. The truth is the rich will benefit, but it will be their money that stimulates the
economy. This will enable all Americans to have more stable jobs and retirement
investments that go up instead of down. This is not a time for envy, and it’s not a time for politics. It’s time for all of us, as Americans, to stand up, speak out, and fix this mess.

__________________
"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”—Samuel Adams

Where have all the Conservatives Gone?

1. Insurance is just another way to bail them out. The only difference is that there is no way we can make back our money with insurance. How exactly is this not a bailout when taxpayers must pay when mortgages fail? I've seen Repubs claim that banks should be paying for this insurance, but why the hell would you try and solve a liquidity crisis by making banks spend their liquid funds on insurance?


2. CEO pay is an infinitesimally small drain on bank finances


3. If rewriting mortgages could fix the problem then banks already would have done so. This also encourages irresponsible borrowing because the borrowers could take out risky variable loans thinking that if they couldn't pay them the lender would reduce the interest rate to a cheaper fixed amount.

4. Changing mark to market rules might help temporarily, but this is ultimately a bad policy. If a bank or other financial institution plans on trading an asset they should have to price it according to the market. Assets that are intended to be held to maturity are priced at book value for commercial banks anyway.


5. Taking away capital gains taxes does absolutely nothing to help failing banks. A failing bank by definition does not have any capital gains. This would only help investors, and an artificial uptick in a banks stock price does nothing to increase it's liquidity.

There are Republicans in the Senate proposing a similar program called (I believe) the "No Bailout Bill" but it has some of your features and would be handled by the FDIC. It is estimated to cost as little as $8 billion and would be paid for from the FDIC fund and not by the taxpayers.


They are organizing to filibuster any taxpayer funded proposal so anything the House does could be moot.

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Soldiers swear to protect and defend the Constitution with their lives.

Politicians swear to protect and defend the Constitution with someone else's life.