The US$700 billion bailout failed, leading to the biggest drop in the U.S. financial market ever. It’s shocking, and deplorable how this might have happened.

An article on the MSNBC website regarding the bailout revealed the thoughts of one man who voted against it:

Rep. Jack Kingston, R-Ga., said he had three insurmountable problems with the bill: It was too expensive, it rewarded Wall Street firms by guaranteeing private profits with public funds and it did not address an antiquated regulatory system.

“This throws a life jacket to Wall Street, but it doesn’t teach them to swim and prevent this from happening again,” Kingston said.

Sure, the bailout is no panacea. But the problem with the economy right now is that it’s reeling from the events (the bankruptcies and close bankruptcies of so many major financial instutitions) of the past few weeks. The economy is not thinking of jumping into the water: it is in the water. What it needs now is not a lesson on how to swim; it needs a life jacket. It needs to be rescued, put on dry land, and only after that be taught to swim.

As much as I agree prevention is better than cure, when prevention’s too late, it’s too late.