Congress met on Sept. 25 to start the discussion over whether they should use $700 billion of taxpayer's money to bailout investment firms that are nearing bankruptcy.
On Sept. 29 the House of Representatives defeated the bailout bill 228-205, making the bill have to be moved to vote in the Senate who passed a revised and edited version of the bill on Oct. 2.
Many congress members believe that the language of the bill doesn't fix the problems that put us in this crisis in the first place.
"There are a number of us who have serious questions about why we haven't been given any alternative other than this one, which gives a massive bailout to Wall St. and doesn't do anything about addressing the underlying issues of speculation and the lack of regulation." Congressman Dennis Kucinich of Ohio said.
Others blame speaker of the house Nancy Pelosi for the failure of the bill. John Boehner, House Minority Leader states said, "We could have gotten there today had it not been for the partisan speech that the speaker gave on the floor of the House."
Over the last month, the economy has been all over the mainstream media outlets. The impact could be seen with the news of Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy protection on Sept. 15, AIG having to be rescued by the Federal Reserve on Sept. 16, Washington Mutual collapsing on Sept. 25, and even the Dow Jones stock plunging more in one day than ever before on Sept. 29. The crisis can be felt even here at Green River Community College.
In a survey conducted around GRCC, it was found that about half of the people interviewed were aware of the debate in congress over the bailout of Wall St., but didn't know enough about it to make a position on the subject.
The most cited reason for not knowing enough information about the debate in Congress was the rarity of watching the news.
From this survey, most of those who affiliate themselves with the Democratic Party were found to be in favor of the bailout, even though they felt that the government should have stepped in a long time ago.
The most popular reasons for supporting the bailout from the democrats turned out to be the fear of going into an economic depression and seeing no other real options.
When referring to the effect that the bailout would have on the national debt and business management major, Won Chan Chong said, "It is like a black hole; the more you give the bigger the hole is."
Most democrats are staying optimistic about the bailout. 17 year old democrat David Caldwell said, "In a good scenario it will help prevent economic collapse while making back at least half of the cost."
Independent or undecided voters were more split down the middle. About half were not in favor of the bailout. A common defense against the bill involves questioning of why the tax payers should have to pay for the failures of Wall St. and the government.
"Businesses are in business to make money, so if they don't make money, why do I, the tax payer, have to bail them out?" Matt Corey, a 25 year old undecided voter said. "It sounds a bit like we are being asked to make it ok for America to fail." As a young man, I believe in social Darwinism. So, if a business isn't strong enough to survive, let it die to make room for the next, stronger model to take its place."
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