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BREAKING: John McCain pulls fire alarm to avoid taking midterm

So the newsmedia has been abuzz about the "sudden" economic crisis everyone has seen coming. The solution has to walk a fine line; it has to be effective enough to pour confidence back into the market and lift the troubled firms back to a self-sustainable point, but it can't let Wall Street run rampant. That rampant running is what got us into the mess in the first place.

The solution? In my mind, the Democratic Congress needs to come up with a sound and comprehensive plan to dole out the necessary funds in a way that can be controlled, contained, and tracked. The discretion of such a large sum cannot be in the hands of a monarch or oligarch; it needs to be given a maximum level of scrutiny by economists working for the government. Without oversight, greed could take the reigns again and the bigwigs will hop out of the plane with their golden parachutes in hand.

The money may very well be necessary, or at least that's what a lot of top economists are saying. Without it, interdependent business could be dragged down next until only commodity stocks are left standing. This leads to a ridiculous amount (projected 20-30% by some sources, such as Bernanke's testimony) of dollar devaluation, slows imports, and loss of assets/liquidity.

The Democratic Congress needs to author a bill that they can accept, with the necessary transparencies and regulations strapped to it. They can't compromise on this; it can't be pushed through haphazardly no matter how necessary it is now. The bill must have an amount of oversight and control that allows the government to slip its tendrils into the banks it is helping directly. If the banks recover, they owe what they got back; it might take a phased recovery cycle, but it is necessary to hold the banks accountable for what they received in help. And if they fail? The US will have more problems than $700 billion of loans.

Once the bill is crafted and passed, Congress can adjourn. The President can take or leave the bill; if he accepts it, he's making concessions he doesn't like (oversight, regulatory changes, etc). If he vetoes the bill, well, hold on tight because in all likelihood it's going to be a bumpy ride.

The bottom line is that the Democrats need to grow a spine and stand up to the deregulatory, lock-step Republicans on this one. Put provisions in place that will tighten the regulations on the entire banking industry with the bill. Make sure this never, ever happens again.

EDIT: http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=798161
Yes, let's inflate our way out of the problem. This is exactly the wrong thing to do; devaluing the dollar further is digging the hole deeper.

A very good description of a possible scenario
lending freezes up. Companies can't get short term financing to pay wages, fly their sales people around etc, and start falling over (LOTS of companies are profitable, but only get cash at certain times of the year depending on when people pay them, so they borrow for day-to-day and pay it back as needed.). People can't start new companies because nobody will lend them money. Tons of people lose their jobs at the same time. The 11 trillion dollar debt that the govt has probably wont help them attend to the unfortunates. Bio fuel farms are converted to cabbage farms to supply soup kitchens. unless this 700 odd billion dollar injection helps us deflate the bubble in an orderly fashion.