Daniel is sounding a lot like Bastiat lately!

“More to the point, there is a presumption that action, even foolish, excessive action, is preferable to inaction”

Didn’t you know Mr. Larison, that its always ‘better to be safe than sorry’? People are always prone to overreact rather than underreact. There is no fighting this impulse–even a call for restraint must be rhetorically dressed up as proactive to be persuasive. But you lose the argument anyway unless you cause people to reexamine what they assume to be “safe”.

“Safe” is now closely associated with government interventionism and socialism. Seizing the narrative from the establishment requires we make a convincing case that the “safe” option is actually the “sorry” option. The fact that reality is a choice between “sorry” and “sorry-er” doesn’t make our job easy.

People tend to overlook the negative consequences of government intervention when they identify/agree with the intention and the objective. The moral degeneracy of war is overlooked in a similar way. We musn’t get boxed into the rhetorical frame of government as implied rescuer. A reframing of the issue, i.e. “the government intervention itself is a crisis more damaging to our economy and standard of living than the problem it’s trying to alleviate. etc.” Should be pushed hard by those who know this to be the truth.

The socialists are really coming out of the woodwork (have you ever heard the government referred to as “The Sovereign” before now?), using a very effective sales technique: the Aggressive Assumption. Widely utilized by idealogues and telemarketers everywhere, it limits the parameters of “acceptable” dialogue, and guides the conversation toward a pre-conceieved conclusion. “Only a whacko would dispute the need for intervention! You’re not a whacko, are you? You’re not, you say? Well, its settled then.”

The only effective counter is to attack the assumption directly.

We should know by now that vindication alone doesn’t afford any consideration by an establishment hostile to anything that might upset the status quo.

If we are right about the nature of this crisis, and about our terrifying predictions for the country should this state of affairs continue, then we’re obligated as good citizens to kick down doors and bellow from the rooftops, metaphorically speaking.

Why wouldn’t they? Whoever votes against it faces the wrath of right wing radio and a radical and well funded conservative primary challenger in the next election.

Sec. 8. Review.
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

Sec. 2. Review:

(3) designating financial institutions as financial agents of the Government, and they shall perform all such reasonable duties related to this Act as financial agents of the Government as may be required of them;

No accountability at all, and the ability to designate any financial institution, healthy or unhealthy, not just as temporarily being in some type of receivership (which I think I could reluctantly support) while it’s assets are liquidated, but the de facto nationalization of whatever institution strikes the Secretary of the Treasury’s fancy on any given day. Even if Paulson or his successor actually had some type of God-like wisdom, this is a terrible horrible no good very bad deal.