Price Tag for the Bailout? $700 Billion

At a news conference, Bush said:

"It is a big package because it's a big problem. The risk of doing nothing far outweighs the risk of the package."

The proposal had already been sent overnight by the White House to Congress (you can read the full text here).

Banking Committee chairman Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn) said:

“It’s a rather brief bill with a lot of money. We understand the importance of the anticipation in the markets, but we also know that what we’re doing is going to have consequences for decades to come. There’s not a second act to this — we’ve got to get this right.”

While many are concerned over the continued troubles in the financial industry, some economists have said that the "play," so to speak, should be allowed to "play itself out" and that the bailout amounts to Socialism in America.

After all, the free-market economy says that good companies profit while bad companies go bankrupt. "Survival of the fittest," and all. But it seems that human greed led to where we are, and it's now so big there is little choice.

None other than mutual fund pioneer John Bogle told Bloomberg:

"We're playing a game of casino capitalism, interfering with the way the market is working. The government seems punch drunk. It doesn't seem systematic.”

At the very least, taxpayers are outraged, with many saying that while it now appears this must be done, it should never have reached the point that it needed to be done.

A failure of common sense. as well as a reduction in regulation, led to this. It should be obvious to all that making loans to those who cannot afford to pay for them was a bad idea.

It should also have been obvious that changing our economy such that we produce nearly nothing, yet consume more than any other nation, would lead to huge trade deficits, not a good thing either.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and lawmakers are expected to work through the weekend in an effort to write a bill, with Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill saying they expect the bill to go before a vote within days.

Will it work? Is it the right thing to do? Are the rich skating with their wealth while the middle-class foots the bill? And if the rich get away with it, how does that make YOU feel, when the rich includes nearly all of our politicians and their cronies (except perhaps for McCain who feels $5 million is middle-class)?