Bailout has candidates for Congress grousing

Sauk Valley-area congressional candidates have few kind words for Washington's $700 billion economic bailout - including those who held their nose and voted for it, and those seeking to replace them in the November election. U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, R-Egan, 16th Congressional District incumbent, and Green Party candidate Scott Summers of Harvard have blasted the plan. Although Manzullo's other challenger, Democrat Robert Abboud, said he would have voted for it, he also said it left much to be desired. As it happens, their plans to reverse the economic slump share common ground, including lowering energy costs and restoring America's manufacturing base. Manzullo voted against the bill both times, and said he was angry that the bailout was sold as the only solution. "It gives $700 billion to the secretary of the treasury to spend as he sees fit, from bad mortgages to bad auto loans to bad credit card debt, and it's all done on the backs of taxpayers," Manzullo said. Abboud, a nuclear engineer and president of the village of Barrington Hills, said he would have demanded that the bill require more equity from companies receiving the bailout money, and impose high taxes on their executives' earnings. Yet, he said one of the few times he has ever agreed with President Bush was on the need for the bailout. "The reality is, we were very close to seeing the financial market in total collapse," Abboud said. Summers, an attorney and a McHenry County College trustee, said the bailout will be good only for increasing the already-bloated national debt, and Americans' taxes. U.S. Rep. Bill Foster, D-Geneva, twice voted for the rescue package, but said after its passage that it felt more like "a declaration of war," by the House against country's financial difficulties. The 14th Congressional District representative said the addition of almost $150 billion in various tax breaks and spending measures used to ensure passage in the Senate left him with mixed feelings. He said he welcomed the inclusion of the Alternative Minimum Tax relief and the extension of a tax credit for research and development. But many of the spending proposals he disagreed with. Despite his misgivings, he said, the bill was needed, as reflected by the continuing turmoil in the credit markets and on Wall Street. "It's become obvious to the business community that there is a looming disaster," Foster said. Foster's Republican opponent in the November election, Jim Oberweis of Sugar Grove, has maintained his opposition to the financial rescue package. In a statement, Oberweis said the plan was "fatally flawed," and had hoped Congress would have begun a new process that "would have resulted in better legislation to safeguard the interests of taxpayers while at the same time addressing the crisis on Wall Street." U.S. Rep. Phil Hare, D-Rock Island, twice voted for the bailout bill. "I don't necessarily know if this is going to work," said Hare, who is running unopposed in the 17th District. "I hope and pray that it does." There are few things he wishes were in the legislation, such as a bankruptcy provision to try to keep people in their homes. "I didn't want the person to negotiate with the lender," Hare said. "I wanted them to go before of a bankruptcy judge, present their case, let the judge look at their income, what's coming in what's going out, and hopefully have the bankruptcy judge keep in their house at a lower percentage." That type of provision could have killed the legislation, though, Hare said. The first-term congressman also said he would like a $50 billion infrastructure investment in the country, which would help create jobs. "For every $1 invested [in infrastructure], we get $5 back," Hare said. Telegraph Reporter Joseph Bustos and Kane County Chronicle reporter Jonathan Bilyk contributed to this report.