Senate Tries to Revive Bailout Bill

 Today the senate is making modifications to the bailout bill that the house killed on Monday. A vote is scheduled for tonight. By modifications I mean earmarks to make everyone happy. The bill has swelled to over 400 pages from it’s original length of three pages and we are to believe that all of these senators and congressmen are going to have enough of a grasp on everything that is in the bill by the time they vote?

 This bill has blossomed in to much more than the original bailout bill. For example:

tucked away in the tax provisions is a landmark health care provision demanding that insurance companies provide coverage for mental health treatment—such as hospitalization—on parity with physical illnesses.

 Maybe not a bad idea but what does this have to do with Wall Street?

And:

The rural school aid is smaller —about $3.3 billion over the next five years

Again, this is supposed to be a bailout of Wall Street, not a pork package. Instead of starting from scratch the senate has decided to keep throwing more and more pork into this bill until they have the votes to pass it. Please somebody explain to me how this makes it a better deal.

 I would prefer that as long as we are going to have a bailout forced on us it might as well be the one that house Republicans are crafting. At lead that one isn’t a TOTAL government takeover.