‘Something must be done’

At hearings in Las Vegas on Tuesday, Nevadans who have lost their jobs or their homes -- or both -- told a federal panel that $700 billion transferred to Wall Street by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke have done nothing to improve financial conditions outside New York.

The three-week-old panel, created by Congress to monitor the bailout money it authorized in October and chaired by Harvard law professor Elizabeth Warren, chose to hold its first "field" hearing in Southern Nevada, according to the hearing schedule, because of its status as "Ground Zero of the Housing and Financial Crises."

Nevada has led the nation in foreclosures for nearly two years; by the end of 2008, Clark County is expected to see 30,000 foreclosures. Unemployment in the state is at a 25-year high, about 1 percentage point above the national level, and is likely to hit 10 percent in 2009, according to Keith Schwer, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at UNLV.

"Our country is in peril," Ms. Warren said Tuesday. "Taxpayer dollars are flowing into banks, but there is little evidence of what effect these hundreds of billions of dollars are having on the very obvious troubles facing us: mortgage foreclosures, restricted small-business lending and rising unemployment. ...There was no evidence today that the money is making it past the top levels of the financial institutions. ..."

In a possible indication of how much Congress really cares, the only congressman assigned to the panel, Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, did not attend.

To her credit, Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., did show up. She was highly critical of the bailout plan, acknowledging that her misgivings over Mr. Paulson's initial demand that Congress, in essence, "give him the money and not ask any questions" led her to vote against the proposal the first time it came before the House.

She said she later changed her mind after hearing from constituents.

As a result, Ms. Berkley said Tuesday, hundreds of billions of dollars have gone "to prop up Wall Street banks and investment companies, but little to help people in Las Vegas who are losing their homes."

She also was skeptical there was much the current panel could do to help. "This is after the fact. The money is gone," Rep. Berkley said.

She said a mouthful. The real question is why anyone should be surprised.

Credit is tight because of lender uncertainty. Lenders, borrowers and investors are uncertain what to do because Mr. Paulson and Mr. Bernanke -- and Congress -- are playing "Eenie-Meanie-Minie-Moe" to decide who gets bailed out and who doesn't.

The time to ask by precisely what mechanism those big loans were supposed to help Mr. and Mrs. Man-on-the-Street, Rep. Berkley, was before you signed the check. The time to set up oversight and accountability -- as you now so wistfully note -- was before the money was handed over.

Rep. Berkley's first instinct -- to vote "No" until there was some realistic, detailed plan and explanation for how the money would do any good to average Americans -- was correct.

We congratulated her on that first vote, at the time. Ms. Berkley may have meant well, but her mistake came a few days later, when she threw up her hands and bent to pressure, casting a vote based on widespread wailing that, "Something must be done."

Shoveling more billions of taxpayer dollars into the furnace because "something must be done" is not a credible economic recovery plan. For the banks, for Detroit, for anyone.

Panel member Damon Silvers, associate general counsel for the national AFL-CIO, did attend Tuesday's hearing. Fundamental questions need to be asked about the bailout that was rushed through Congress with little built-in oversight, Mr. Silvers said Tuesday.

Indeed. Especially before they do it again.