Argh

The Common Man set forth this past weekend to the northernmost woods, sure that the financial crisis was being averted and that, as John McCain mentioned in the first debate between he and Barak Obama (which The Common Man and The Uncommon Wife listened to in the car on the way north, and both agreed that Obama at least held serve against and perhaps gained ground on his rival), that "a deal had been reached." Sadly, this was not to be.

Instead, after a weekend of fishing, boating, and playing with The Boy and his grandparents in the relatively unspoiled beauty of Lake Muskellunge, The Common Man returned home to find headlines like "Lawmakers point fingers as bailout fails" and "Backers scramble after bailout failure hits stocks." Indeed, all hell has broken loose on the floors of Congress and Wall Street. Investors are running for cover, and House Republicans are just running. The shift in tone from last week (worried) to this (panicked out of their gourd) was palpable.

The Common Man won't pretend to understand the ins and outs of the rescue plan, nor to know with any certainty whether it will succeed or fail. But he does know that, if you want to know whether any radical plan is a good idea, it's best to look at the actions of disinterested parties, those who have no outside reason to want the plan to succeed or fail outside of their own good nature.

After all, The Common Man believes that most politicians are cowards, more concerned with keeping their jobs than with actually improving the country. And, sure enough, when you look at the Congressional voting record, you find that Congressmen who are not running for reelection overwhelmingly support the bill. According to fivethirtyeight.com, "among 26 congressmen NOT running for re-election (almost all of whom are Republicans), 23 voted in favor of the bill, as opposed to 2 against and one abstaining." Meanwhile, among the 38 Congressmen in tight elections, 30 voted against the measure, a development that is less surprising given how poorly the issue has been framed in the popular media and its resultant unpopularity.

So, it seems clear, Republicans in the House of Representatives refused to act in the best interests of this nation (as did 40% of Democrats), fearing for their political lives. That's the definition of unmanly, and The Common Man is disgusted with this Dewmocracy.