Reid and Co. may just win a big game of chicken.

This is not a good time to be playing chicken. However, Reid and Bush were playing chicken before the vote. Reid wanted Bush to authorize TARP money, and Bush wanted Congress to pass a bill to pull it from the other funds. Reid "folded" and there was a vote which didn't pass. Now Bush is reconsidering the TARP money. He may just use it too.

Reid is a lot of things, but he isn't dumb. He may do something you don't like, but he is calculating all the time.He left a Senator in DC to gavel sessions opened and closed so Bush couldn't make recess appointments when Congress was gone. Reid may have known that the bill wouldn't pass. Now the backlash is beginning. Europe is already shaking and having to make moves because they have ties to the auto industry that weren't obvious. Bush may act to dampen the problems caused by the bailout failure.

I don't like this "game." However, I wouldn't underestimate Reid. This is some weird kind of Washington political Kabuki theater.
It doesn't make sense to us, but they all know their parts. Everyone has to appear to be forced in order to justify whatever. The Southern Rethugs needed to score points with voters back home. This show should close.

The Bush administration said today it was willing to consider using funds from other sources to provide emergency aid to the nation's Big Three car companies following the Senate's rejection Thursday night of a Congressional bailout plan.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/12/AR2008121201232.html?hpid=topnews

Bet it happens.

You think with all the Hollywood contacts, our Dem leaders would take lessons in theater to use against the Republicans. The Republican political theater could easily be defeated by a strong Dem opposition, but the Republicans have NO competition from our Dem leaders so they control the media spin.

Even if Bush gets money from Tarp.

The rest of the country needs to KNOW that the Senators who voted AGAINST the bailout were very specifically targetting the unions and that is so totally UN-AMERICAN that these chuckleheads should be DRIVEN from office.

They are flunkies for corporations outside the US, trying to drive salaries into the third world. This CANNOT stand -- please do NOT stop pushing this theme until it's soaked into the landscape.

The point to use for Southern states is not South vs North. Use a labor vs management theme. The South went through a bloody time trying to form unions in the textile mills. Don't think that's forgotten. I don't think anybody down here forgets anything. Point out that those textile mills are closing and the jobs are outsourced overseas. It sure wasn't because of the high pay and unions that the mill owners did that.

I'd point out to those workers in those Southern auto factories that the only reason the plants are there is because the states fell all over each other offering huge tax breaks and concessions. If a time comes where they can determine that it will be more cost effective to move overseas, they will be gone in a heartbeat. Then Shelby, McConnell, DeMint and whoever else can hold their breath and pout, but those jobs won't be back.

They were able to be opposed to the bill, without facing the consequences of one of the big 3 going into bankruptcy.