Taxpayers will feel the pinch from Wall Street bailout

Editor,

Who will pay for the bailout?

Less than two weeks ago, John McCain and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson declared the fundamentals of our economy were sound. Now, American taxpayers are told we must pay the bill to bail out financial institutions that have recently failed or are failing at a price likely to exceed $1 trillion. And the Bush bailout plan has no restrictions on either Paulson or on salaries and bonuses for executives of the failed institutions.

But there's worse news. The cost of bailing out these failed institutions is going to come at the little guy's expense. Student loans? Sorry. We won't have the money. Affordable health care? Forget it. We won't have the money. New schools and more teachers? Too bad. We won't have the money. Repairs for the country's neglected infrastructure? More police and fire fighters? Aid for the poor and homeless? They're not going to happen. We won't have the money. Health care for returning vets who have served up to five tours of combat duty in Afghanistan and Iraq? Don't count on it, and they likely won't get huge bonuses for putting their lives on the line for our country, either. Social Security and Medicare benefits could also be targets. The money has to come from somewhere. Meanwhile, McCain wants to continue Bush's program of tax cuts, which benefit mostly the wealthy. These tax cuts, along with the wars with Afghanistan and Iraq, have already brought the country close to bankruptcy. And now add $1 trillion more to bail out the financial institutions.

Many factors have contributed to this current financial crisis, the worst since the Great Depression. One key factor is a policy called deregulation, a Republican notion that big business will do the right thing and doesn't need government to look over its shoulder. Now big business wants the government to bail them out. And all the deregulators are calling for more regulation. If Congress had been doing its job as watchdog, we would not be in this mess. Now you and I, the taxpayers, are going to feel the pinch while the fat cats who got us into this mess are going to enjoy their big, fat bonuses. We can't afford to give the Republicans four more years to ruin our economy completely.

Merry Sisneros

Daily Lobo reader