The U.S. Senate has passed the ill-advised 700 billion dollar Wall St. bailout package by a frightening 74-25 majority. The bill will now return to the House of Representatives for concurrence or rejection. A vote in the house is expected on Friday.

Please redouble your efforts in contacting your House representative and ask them to reject this boondoggle. There are many reasons to oppose this monstrosity. Here are a few:

1. It is an unconstitutional intervention into our free market.
2. The beneficiaries are the very same businesses and people who created the ‘crisis’ we’re in the midst of.
3. There is no evidence that it will actually do anything in the long run, except perhaps encourage more bad decision making and lead to more (and bigger) bailouts in the coming years and decades.
4. It’s one more slide down the slippery slope to socialism.

Shame on every Senator who voted in favor of this. This includes my own two Senators (Senator John Warner (R-VA) and Senator Jim Webb (D-VA)) and the two major-party Presidential candidates (Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Senator Barack Obama (D-IL)). You all have sold-out your constituents and you have sold-out America.

I pray that the House does not concur.

The 700 billion dollar transfer of your hard-earned dollars to the Wall Street moguls who created our economic mess is a bad idea that just refuses to die. Rarely in our history has such an ill-advised piece of legislation been seriously considered by our Congress. Conservative Americans oppose the plan because it would be an unprecedented government intervention in our free market economy that will do more harm than good. Liberal Americans oppose it because the beneficiaries of this windfall are the very people who took advantage of poor and uneducated home buyers and created the economic mess we find ourselves in today.

But, despite broad public opposition, many leaders of both the Republican and Democratic parties support it. President George W. Bush (R), House Speaker Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA 8th), and both major party Presidential nominees Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) are all supporters. The bill failed in the House yesterday, but it failed narrowly. The Senate will be considering it again tomorrow, and our Congressmen will continue to bring it up until it passes.

Do not believe the fire-and-brimstone talk of bailout supporters. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ‘crashed’ a record 777 points yesterday, but recovered more than half of that amount today. Things are not that bad, and there is no evidence that this bailout will have any long term benefit (though there are many long term risks, and the establishment of a dangerous precedent of government interventionism).

I implore all of my readers, Republican and Democrat, to contact all of your Congressional representatives in the House and Senate immediately and demand that they reject this unprecedented waste of your money. Send emails, make phone calls, drop by (if you live near DC). The leaders of the Republican and Democratic parties will try to force this bill through by any means necessary, and we must make sure they know we oppose them.

The U.S. Capitol switchboard, (202) 224-3121, can get you in touch with the offices of your two Senators and your Representative. You can also send emails to any or all of your Congressional representatives through the excellent Congress.org web site.

DO NOT DELAY. There are, literally, only hours to make your voice heard. The debate is tentatively scheduled for about 9pm Wednesday, and the bill is being tied to a number of earmarks and unrelated issues (like Exxon Valdez victim benefits [!?!?]) that will make it harder for members to vote against it.

Perhaps I spoke too soon. Despite the announcement that the president and Congress had reached agreement yesterday on an unprecedented Wall Street bailout, the bill went to the floor of the House of Representatives for a vote today and failed 228-205. It appears, much to my pleasant suprise, that sensible Republicans and Democrats joined together to vote against this reckless waste of your and my tax dollars.

Following the vote the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped precipitously over 600 points. The Dow fluctuated up and down between a 400 and 600 point loss most of the afternoon before crashing again to a -777 point close. This is the largest one-day point drop in the history of the Dow, but it only accounts for about a 7 percent loss. Percentage-wise, this does not even rate in the top-10 of one-day losses.

The roll call on this vote is available from the Clerk of the House of Representatives web site . . . the title and description are misleading, since the bailout was apparently structured as an amendment to a previous and only-loosely-related bill, but this is indeed the vote tally for the bailout. Unfortunately my representative, Representative Frank Wolf (R-VA 10th), voted in favor of this ill-advised monstrosity.