The good folks at PublicMarkup.org have placed the competing $700 billion mortgage bailout plans online to allow the public to read and comment on them while Congress considers its options in the midst of the greed-fueled nosedive of Wall Street.
The Treasury Department’s mortgage bailout plan and Sen. Chris Dodd’s counterproposal have, thus far, generated more than 200 comments on the intricacies of credit reform and federal oversight.
Dry subject matter to be sure. But with an unprecedented nationalizing of the American mortgage industry, as finance experts have described it, a little “torch and pitchfork accountability” is a sorely needed public resource. But will taxpayers — who rarely read the fine print on anything short of a cereal box — rise to the challenge and demand a fair and equitable plan out of the credit crisis?
Public Markup is a project of the Sunlight Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based government transparency group. In the interest of full disclosure, the Sunlight Foundation is a contributor to the Center for Independent Media, the parent organization of The Colorado Independent.
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