I smell a rat

If our banking system cannot weather a storm: do we want to preserve it in it's current form?

If U.S. financial markets and banking are so fragile as to be toppled by Congressional Fannie Freddie Affirmative Action FUBAR: do we want those markets and that banking system to continue standing? Do we want to prop up a banking system which depends on the sanity of Congress?

Isn't it better - if that banking system cannot stand in the face of Congressional FUBAR - to let those markets and that banking system fail? Isn't it better to allow something fresher and more resilient to arise from the ashes?

I am too ignorant to take a stand on this, yet I smell a rat. A month before an election, I am massively suspicious of everyone's motivation. For every hour which passes with markets still standing, still functioning, and without any meltdown beginning: my suspicion only increases.

Mark Steyn:

If the entire global economy is so vulnerable that only the stalwart action of Barney Frank stands between it and ten years of soup kitchens, can it, in fact, be saved?
[...]
was the five per cent fall in Asian markets and seven per cent "plummet" on the Dow in reaction to the House vote really the catastrophe some of my pals round here seem to think it was? If fear of seven per cent falls is enough to justify massive unprecedented government intrusion into the private sector, we might as well cut to the chase and go for the big Soviet command economy.

Look at that: Rush Limbaugh is on the same page...

"When the government fails to pass a socialism bill and the market goes south, let it go south."
[...]
"For every person you hear saying this bailout is going to strengthen the market, it's the exact opposite. The market's not being allowed to work here because the losers haven't been flushed out."
[...]
"Understand what's going on, here: liberalism is liberalism, and the liberals are in the process of stealing the country. If they succeed in this, folks, it's going to take a generation to roll this back."

I may be ignorant, but I'm not lonesome.