Commentary

Round 1: Bailout fails House vote

Breaking news: The bailout has failed a roll call vote on the floor of the House. It was voted against 205 yea, 228 nea, with 1 abstain. Nearly 100 Democrats voted against the measure, presumably because the final version of the bailout plan failed to provide cash assistance for struggling mortgage owners. The vote came as a significant surprise as House and Senate leaders were very confident that they had reached an agreeable program this weekend to fix the financial markets. It is unclear at this point what Congress will do next, but Democratic leaders feel the bill is not dead yet. There will not be another vote today, Rep. Barney Frank said they will “assess economic reaction” before determining the next course of action. There will now be significant back door discussions to try and pull some of the “nea” votes over to the “yea” side and then revote on the measure.