Bailout talk from 2 candidates

From the Nader/Gonzalez Campaign: Haste Makes Waste.

Independent presidential candidate and longtime consumer advocate Ralph Nader said today that he opposes giving Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson -- heralded as King Henry on the cover of Newsweek -- what amounts to a blank check for $700 billion with nothing more than a promise to keep the U.S. financial system from imploding. Nader said that any bailout should have strict accountability, conflict-of-interest, regulatory, and oversight rules attached, including a cap on executive compensation and stock warrants for the rescuing taxpayers.

"Of all the insults Bush's monarchy has ever hurled at Congress, a supposedly co-equal branch of government, this one breaks new ground in shattering the bedrock principle of separation of powers and checks and balances under our Constitution and replacing it with blanket Congressional surrender of its authority to Bush's White House.

"Rather than race home to run for re-election, members of Congress should do what they were sent to Washington to do: carefully draft the legislation that will serve the needs of Main Street and Elm Street, not the greed, fraud and recklessness of Wall Street.

"Why should the American taxpayers bail-out fraud, recklessness and criminal irresponsibility?" asks Nader. "Why should the American people trust the judgment of the very administration that has gotten us into this mess?"

Nader expressed strong agreement with William Greider of The Nation who recently wrote that "If Wall Street gets away with this, it will represent an historic swindle of the American public -- all sugar for the villains, lasting pain and damage for the victims."Nader also calls for changes to the bill that would include:
• Provisions for homeowners to stay in their homes in default, or rent them at market value.
• A cap on executive compensation and disgorgement of ill-gotten gains.
• A stimulus package for infrastructure repair and upgrade to generate new community jobs.
• Comprehensive regulation of and disclosures by the financial industry and Wall Street to prevent this from occurring again.
• Prudent margin requirements on derivatives trading and a tax on securities derivatives transactions.
• Shareholders control over the corporations they own.
• Tougher criminal enforcement against culpable firms and executives.

From the Green Party (not on the SC ballot):

Cynthia McKinney / Rosa Clemente Campaign Update.

Last week's statement, issued in the wake of the $81 billion give-away to AIG is now seeming more prescient every day, with another $700 billion give-away proposed for the very bankers who's gambling in the derivatives market created the crisis. Meanwhile we watch as both parties in Congress continue to ignore a related foreclosure crisis that is putting more and more people on the streets every day.

We hope you will use this week to empower people in your community, to share the questions Cynthia raises and the proposals for 'fundamental change' she identifies and use the following piece to let folks know that we do have a choice in 2008. Ours is a real choice, not one between banker-financed candidates parroting policies already set in motion to destroy this planet and its peoples. We get to choose between peace and war, between justice and avarice, between voting for our highest hopes and aspirations, rather than merely against our worst fears.