How and why did Congress move so quickly on the bailout bill? Congress was able to pass this very complex, high-dollar legislation in a matter of days–nevermind the fact there had been signs of a subprime crisis that's at the root of all this–for months if not years. Relatively speaking, CURIA, which has been floating around the marble halls of Capitol Hill in various forms for the last five years, is simple however, so you'd think they could accomplish this in a matter of hours. But, the fact of the matter is that lawmakers tend to wait until there's a crisis that finally outweighs political concerns before they act.

Congress would not address it in increments along the way because of various political pressures. One of the Bush administration's big claims a few years ago was that the United States had more homeowners than ever before. We'll see how long that lasts now. From the other side of the aisle, Democrats said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were just fine and blocked efforts to further regulate them, despite the news of massive accounting errors, the changing of the guard and the expansion of the types of paper they would accept, which all ultimately led to conservatorship.

So instead of making tweaks here and there along the way to prevent crisis, now Congress had to rush a massive bailout, pork barrel and all, which probably no one has read entirely. Few will even dare to predict its final impact, and wisely so.