The Paulson Plan - business as usual

So the response of a Democratic Congress to Paulson's bailout is in (New York Times and Washington Post).

Some things are sensible: the plan as originally drafted, clearly needed more oversight. And I think Mr. Paulson is wrong about executive pay. It's necessary to make the bill palatable to the public and any CEO who takes the golden parachute while his firm goes bust rather than participating is frankly going to have to get a new identity in Latin America.

Sadly, they didn't stop there and the thing risks becoming a political football. The push "for assistance for distressed homeowners" (NYT) is wrong-minded. Not because they shouldn't get assistance but that this does need to be a "clean bill". As a sidenote, I think 'focused' is probably a better word here. There's nothing clean about it. But the US Congress needs to curtail its usual dysfunction and get a bill passed. If it needs to be fixed later, so be it.

I'm doubtful this will happen though. Both parties are going to play to the gallery with this one.