If this country is going to spend $700 billion in taxpayer's money to get the economy going again, why the hell are we sending it back to the Wall Street casino?
If our priority is really Main Street then screw the investment bankers, let's send it back to Main Street directly. Why not go with the National Main Street Center of the National Trust for Historic Preservation?
My current city, which has been devastated by factory closures since the 1970s, is finally seeing its Downtown come around again thanks to Main Street programs that have renovated two old downtown theaters and are making our downtown a center of art and commerce and fun again. We also are lucky to have a business community that actually supports things like a local arts council to try to get us turned around.
http://www.mainstreet.org/...
But that's only the start to how this money could be better served investing in public works projects.
Let's rebuild our urban centers public transportation systems. For example, Chicago could desperately use some funds for a total rehaul of the El system and O'Hare expansion if it is going to be any shape to host the Olympics in 2016.
Let's do some real road construction in this state and country. Although we don't want more people to drive, we could fix the roads that do exist so that they are smoother and then the cars that drive on them travel much more fuel efficiently because their tires go flat less.
Let's send money to our small towns desperately in need of funds for public works. My hometown has been in need of a new public sewer system for 25 years and it has gotten to the point the mayor has had to hire a Washington lobbyist to try to get them to find funding for it. This is wrong!
Let's build a lot of electricity infrastructure in the Great Plains, especially the Dakotas, so these windy places that would be great to harness wind energy are finally feasible sites for wind energy developers to set up shop.
Let's build new schools!!!
I just can't help but feeling like this bailout is throwing more money down the drain when the answer is to invest in America and not the stock market.