Look at that time stamp !

Congress leaders, Bush administration reach tentative deal on financial bailout deal

CHARLES BABINGTON and ALAN FRAM
AP News

Sep 28, 2008 00:38 ESTù

Our conscript fathers (and Nancy Pelosi) are actually earning their pay this weekend.

Recall Barney Frank predicted a deal by Sunday.

I have a new plan. My old plan was to make Paulson get Frank's signature on every deal. My new plan is to have Frank run the financial system. With timing like that, he won't need any bailouts.

The plan roughly is as predicted before the absurd Boehner McCain grand standing.
Democrats cave on bankruptcy re-reform but get oversite, limits on CEO compensation, the 700 billion in tranches, a promise from the Treasury to be nice to homeowners if it happens to come into the possession of whole mortgages and, the provision that counts, Warrants*.

The House Republicans get to claim that they had input on the bill

At the insistence of House Republicans, who threatened to sidetrack negotiations at midweek, the insurance provision was added as an alternative to having the government buy distressed securities. House Republicans say it will require less taxpayer spending for the bailout.

But the Treasury Department has said the insurance provision would not pump enough money into the financial sector to make credit sufficiently available. The department would decide how to structure the insurance provisions, said Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., one of the negotiators.

OK so there will be a program including the word "insurance" to be designed without further input from the House Republicans. This shows, in case anyone had any doubts, that they don't care about policy and just care about bragging rights.

Now this could still be a deadly drain on the Treasury. The house Republicans have made Paulson look like a relatively good guy. He can now sell insurance for absurdly low premiums and privatize a lot of public money.

*Doesn't fully make up for giving up on warrants in the appalling FISA cave. Why are these words so similar ?