Free Market .com

How is free market capitalism consistent with the govt financed bailout of the financial sector?

I'm looking for the best Republican justification -- the one that makes some sense.

Public Comments

1. It isn't. The free market laissez -faire foolishness is how we ended up in a financial crisis to start with.
2. Who do you contend is being bailed out now? Please edit or e-mail me.
3. Free Market is only an excuse for over-exploitation. It is a myth. In China it is known as..."get back to work or we'll shoot you, the Americans need their flags to celebrate Independence Day!"
4. Are you saying you want them to collapse? We also have federal deposit insurance, is that bad also?
5. It is not government financed... It is federal reserve guaranteed... The only way that tax payer money would have anything to do with it is if JPMC goes out of business as well... The same rules apply to your money in your savings account! If the bank gets robbed, the federal reserve guarantees that you won't lose a dime... (and I am not a republican)
6. Having the financial markets do some sort of spiraling downward dance hurts the economy, and then, in turn, people. Doing nothing would be, hypothetically, far worse than demonstrating some kind of "conservatives" value lesson. We are still not out of the woods by any stretch of the imagination and could see further cuts in the interest rate, and, more bolstering of financial firms, and, freddie mack and fannie mae, before the credit market gains stability.
7. they haven't quite yet, they have set aside a $30,000,000 fund for the bear sterns acquisition/takeover/merger by JPMorgan.... Its not something I agree with, but then again I didn't agree with how they continually tried to bail out United either.
8. It isn't. But when the economy doesn't do well, people blame the government, not the companies and consumers involved. To save face, the government deviates from a free market policy to assist the economy. The alternative is doing nothing, which I would argue is more dangerous and ignorant than following strict free market ideology. Our system isn't entirely free market either, subsidies for certain companies make them uncompetitive because they provide services that the government deems necessary.
9. There isn't one, I'm a Republican and I can tell you that. Neither is that stimulus package either. Will you donate your stimulus check to a non-profit organization in protest of the hand out? If not then don't complain.
10. It isn't. I don't know of any Republican that's in favor of the bailout. Nor do I know any Republican that was in favor of the forced dropping in standards which forced banks to make loans to low income people that they otherwise wouldn't have. Strike two for government intervention.
11. President Coolidge said it: "The business of government is business." Nothing like simple honesty. There has been since the beginning a constant war between laissez-faire and regulation, with laissez-faire sometimes losing a battle but always coming back stronger than ever. They remind me of the squirrels that have nothing to do all day except look for a way to get into the bird-feeder. If you don't watch them like a hawk, they get their way. Then, everybody suffers, and there will be bail-outs and more regulation, but the next crop of squirrels will bribe Congress to de-regulate. "It will be good for business." That's always the Republican justification. But they mean that it will be good for THEIR business, not ours.