$700 Billion bailout...

This whole thing about a $700 billion bailout is nonsense. First of all, the people that created the problem (Congress) are now trying to cover their asses with the solution of giving $700 billion to the organizations that gave those faulty loans so that they can continue to do business as usual.
This is rewarding incompetence and punishing those who have conventional mortgages and have never missed a payment.
Another solution could be this...Since the total of outstanding first mortgages (under $100,000) totals slightly over $200 billion; why not have the government pay off those mortgages and save the taxpayer $500 billion and the institutions that wrote the bad loans would be "off the hook" (and therefore rewarded for poor business practices).
Of course, the problem still exists in that Congress will continue to try to force institutions to make bad loans by guaranteeing them with taxpayer money and the lenders will continue to make bad loans; thus perpetuating this crisis again.
No matter what is done, the only people that get screwed are those that played by the rules. Everyone else (the greedy lenders, your local Congressman, Wall Street and the scammers that took out loans they couldn't pay) gets rewarded at your expense.
The only realistic solution is to let the lenders fail, the people with those bad loans learn their lesson by losing those houses and vote out every representative in office.
As an example: I can't feel sorry for the bank that loaned money to an illegal alien to buy not one, but four houses with nothing down and at 3% interest, so he could rent out three and live free in one. Now that the interest rates on those loans has been readjusted, he has left the four loans go into default and the bank now owns those four houses that are worth less than the outstanding loans on them. Do I feel badly for the bank ? for the illegal alien ? for his renters ? for who? I'll tell you who. I feel badly for those that have played by the rules and are seeing their savings and 401K accounts become worth less that they put into them.
This problem could never have happened without Congress allowing it (and creating it).
There is no one in Congress that is blameless in this matter (no matter what lie they tell you). Get rid of anyone that has misrepresented you and vote for new Representatives. The new ones can't possibly do more harm than the one's we have now.