Welcome to the final stages of the coup...  In 2000, the long fought for and long admired democracy of the United States of America began a slow and steady decline toward fascism - a Bush family tradition - with the installment of a president - a man the citizens overwhelmingly rejected …

Administration Is Seeking $700 Billion for Wall Street Bailout  —  WASHINGTON — The Bush administration on Saturday formally proposed to Congress what could become the largest financial bailout in United States history, requesting unfettered authority for the Treasury Department to buy up to $700 billion in mortgage-related assets.

Text of Draft Proposal for Bailout Plan  —  LEGISLATIVE PROPOSAL FOR TREASURY AUTHORITY TO PURCHASE MORTGAGE-RELATED ASSETS  —  Section 1.  Short Title.  —  This Act may be cited as ____________________.  —  Sec. 2.  Purchases of Mortgage-Related Assets.

NY Times Makes a Funny  —  From David Herszenhorn at the NY Times: $700 Billion Is Sought for Wall Street in Massive Bailout … I hope you laughed.  I did.  A little gallows humor.  —  And, yes the cost is still unknown, but there is no way that the taxpayers will profit.

Bailout Proposal  —  Here is the proposal so far: (hat tip Michael)

A Bad Bank Rescue  —  With truly extraordinary speed, opinion has swung behind the radical idea that the government should commit hundreds of billions in taxpayer money to purchasing dud loans from banks that aren't actually insolvent.  As recently as a week ago, no public official had even mentioned this option.

Dems on bailout: Include homeowners  —  Democrats are drafting a joint House-Senate bill to expedite action on the Treasury Department's $700 billion rescue plan for the financial markets but want the government to use its new leverage to slow foreclosures and cap compensation …

A Professor and a Banker Bury Old Dogma on Markets  —  WASHINGTON — For the last year, as the nation's economy lurched from crisis to crisis, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, had been warning Henry M. Paulson Jr., the Treasury secretary, that the worsening situation might ultimately force …