Memo to Congress: Toss the Rubber Stamps and Write A Real Economic Recovery Plan

FDR

A Triumph of Democracy

Yesterday, the House of Representatives rejected the Bush Bailout plan, aka the Troubled Asset Recovery Program (TARP). While the New York Times called it a “failure of leadership” in a front page article, it was in fact a triumph of representative democracy. Not only that, the nation seriously dodged a bullet, no thanks to the Democrats, who worked hand-in-glove with Wall Street to give them everything they wanted, and were stymied only due to the efforts of a recalcitrant minority of Democrats and a rebellious majority of Republicans who at last threw off the yoke of enslavement to the Bush administration. Now, to be sure they don’t put it on then next time they convene.

What’s Under the TARP?

The TARP legislation vests so much authority in the Secretary of the Treasury that it is simply a hazardous vehicle for abuse of power under the best of circumstances. While Congress may think that Secretary Paulson is worthy of this grant of trust, we don’t write laws with a celebrity financier in mind – we write them as if Secretary Paulson were out of office already, and the law was being administered by the next Secretary of the Treasury, a person with unknown abilities and good faith. Congress could find itself dealing with Rick Rubin or Phil Gramm in that job – there’s no telling who will get that hot seat in the new administration. Granting the Secretary of the Treasury extensive powers, subject only to review for “arbitrary and capricious conduct,” under the vague guideline that he shall “manage troubled assets in a manner designed to minimize the cost to the taxpayers,” is an excessive grant of authority that Congress cannot justify, least of all when getting it right is more important than getting it done. Getting it done has been done to death.

Cronies Hiding Under The TARP!

Congress should move cautiously, remembering that this is yet another Bush Administration plan, the administration that has given the word “cronyism” a currency unseen since the days of Tammany Hall. Let us look under this TARP, under which the Secretary of the Treasury will be empowered to: (1) Hire and fire all of the employees to administer this Act; (2) Contract for services to perform the Treasury’s duties under the Act; and (3) Designate financial institutions as financial agents of the Federal Government. The American voters are wise to this game – they know that unchecked power breeds unchecked abuses, and if Congress continues to enable the Bush Administration, when this unravels in an unseemly and destructive chain reaction, their offices will be forfeit.

Something’s Rotten In Washington

We the people are profoundly suspicious of the atmosphere of extreme urgency that blew up like a hurricane when the holdings of the vaunted “Masters of the Universe” were imperiled, while Congress may as well have been fiddling like Nero as whole neighborhoods were consumed in a wildfire of foreclosures brought on by abusive lending practices in a deregulated banking environment. We know that this atmosphere of extreme urgency is the same ambiance of catastrophe in which Congress voted in the Patriot Act and approved the Authorization for the Use of Force Against Iraq.

We know that under cover of “the fog of war,” our representatives sat silent or cheered patriotically while Cheney-Bush affiliated companies like Halliburton and Carlyle gorged on no-bid contracts, resulting in soldiers being electrocuted in the safety of their barracks and dying while traveling in lightly armored Humvees. We watched the wanton killing of the Iraqi people by Blackwater, and the State Department’s shameless assertion that our soldiers aren’t good enough to defend State Department personnel. We saw how our representatives wielded their rubber stamps with alacrity each time a bill to grant more money for war and waste came before them. We know they repeatedly approved legislation they had not read, defying our will because, we must presume, they were listening to their shadow constituents, the writers of campaign contribution checks, the financial industry, the military suppliers, and the all-purpose launderers of corruption, the K-Street lobbyists.

Buck-Passing Made Easy

This TARP legislation shows that Congress has once again abdicated responsibility to craft well-thought out laws that can be implemented by the Executive and supervised by the Courts. Instead of actually writing a plan, Congress proposed to authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to make it up as he goes along, give him a checkbook and the authority to buy every type of commercial paper — from payday loans to toxic derivatives, provide him with as long a leash as possible – the arbitrary and capricious standard, authorize him to hire his buddies at any price he deems appropriate, immunize him from suit from financial institutions receiving aid, and invalidate every other law Congress has enacted except the Constitution, turning every case over the implementation of TARP into a potential Supreme Court case. This is god-like authority that might safely be granted to a saint, but will work nothing but mischief in the current environment. John Gotti would have rubbed his hands in glee at the prospect of being able to manage his gang with such efficiency, and even the Gambino Family kneecappers would have balked at such an assertion of power.

Congress Has To Toss Those Rubber Stamps And Write Real Legislation, and We’ve Got to Keep ‘Em Honest

Congress must toss those rubber stamps once and for all, and put a check on the irresponsible behavior of an Executive Branch that has executed one self-interested plan after the other, in defiance of the national interest. All responsible citizens can take this to the bank — you can trust these Congresspeople as far as you can throw the Capitol building, and the only protection we have is ceaseless vigilance, constant phonecalling, emailing and if you have the energy, grassroots education in your neighborhoods, schools, and workplaces. That’s the only way to “keep ‘em honest.”