AIG

WASHINGTON - In a bid to save financial markets and economy from further turmoil, the U.S. government agreed Tuesday to provide an $85 billion emergency loan to rescue the huge insurer AIG. The Federal Reserve said in a statement it determined that a disorderly failure of AIG could hurt the already delicate financial markets and the economy.

In return for the loan, we get 80% of the company.

(I guess that's only called nationalization when a non-Republican does it.)

Maybe Secretary Paulson and Fed Chairman Bernanke should call John McCain so McCain can straighten them out about how sound our economy is, before they go profligately buying up all sorts of other perfectly healthy companies. I'm sure that if Phil Gramm were Secretary of the Treasury, he wouldn't give in to such whining.

By the way, everyone does know that Phil Gramm was personally responsible for the legislation deregulating the financial product that allowed risky loans to be converted into risky securities, thus enabling the whole house of cards that is now coming tumbling down, right?

I don't really understand why John McCain would need a 9/11-style commission to investigate the "old-boy network" and how this Wall Street crisis happened. It seems like he could just turn around and ask Phil Gramm about it himself.