>It's not a question of bailout or no bailout - some sort of bailout will
>happen no matter what. It's a question of what public attitude to take
>toward it. This is a rare moment - the whole country is paying attention
>to national economic policy at the very moment an act of supreme
>bourgeois hypocrisy is about to be carried out. It should not go to
>waste. If the powers that be desperately want a bailout quickly and have
>to go anxiously hat in hand to Congress to get one, the proper attitude
>is to yell about the hypocrisy of bailouts for bankers and austerity for
>workers. That's the only possible way to force them to give something in
>return - you have to scare them into thinking they might not get it if
>they don't make it fairer.
Why not just apply the same conditions to the beneficiaries of the rescue as apply to welfare recipients?
Ritual humiliation, like making them queue up in the rain, fill out ridiculous forms with hundreds of impertinent questions, a means test of course. Make it clear that there are deserving and undeserving victims, that wouldn't be hard. The deserving cases, which it can be made clear are simply careless financial incompetents, will still be humiliated and forced to grovel, but they'll get some relief, eventually, years after applying. maybe in-kind relief, like vouchers. The undeserving can be pilloried on national TV and then get a jail sentence for their trouble.
Like you say, be consistent.
Bill Bartlett Bracknell Tas