Well bear in mind the bailouts were the product of Bush and his team of economic advisors (that is not blaming them, just recognizing the time line). Now it's interesting that Obama kept a number of those advisors in his administration as well. From what I've read on the situation it was SO desperate that SOMETHING had to be done NOW to stabilize the economy. The whole idea was NOT considered a perfect solution. In fact there were grave doubts about whether it would work at all. If it didn't work, were going down hard, desperate times call for desperate measures. In hind sight I'm amazed they were able to put together a plan of attack on such short notice and in fact they did at least "stabilize" the economy. For that, I tip my hat to Bush for having the balls to act, #1 and #2 for really working with Obama for a smooth transition of power. As much as he (Bush) must have known the next administration would really be on him for his failures, he STILL rose to the occasion and did what was right for the Nation. Gotta say, as much as I like to blame Bush (that's the way we play the game around here
), I admire the man as well.