Megan is soooo... frickin' smart....

The Price of the King's Shilling:

"This is troubling, because it's now clear that the worry many of us had at the time of the bank bailouts has come true: the government is using its intervention in the banking system to pressure banks to give special deals to the government's special friends."

What particularly worries me is that it seems so unnecessary. I heard repeatedly from progressives, in the run-up to the bankruptcy case, that the holdouts were unreasonably holding out for a trivial improvement--about 500 million dollars. But if it was so trivial, why didn't the government just put the extra money in, rather than jeopardizing confidence in the bankruptcy system--and the creditworthiness of a large swathe of unionized firms? $500 million is about the price of one cup of coffee per American, a trivial sum relative to the overall budget. This move has shown potential partners that government funds are dangerous, and potential lenders that union firms are risky bets; both have probably cost American citizens more than they saved. So why did the government risk so much for so little gain?

You know the answer, don't you? Because they're planning to do it again.