With the economy on the brink and elections looming, Congress approved an unprecedented $700 billion government bailout of the battered financial industry on Friday and sent it to President Bush for his certain signature.

The final vote, 263-171 in the House, a comfortable margin that was 58 more votes than it garnered on Monday. The vote capped two weeks of tumult in Congress and on Wall Street, punctuated by daily warnings that the country confronted the gravest economic crisis since the Great Depression if lawmakers failed to act.

Immediately after the vote President Bush pledged to quickly sign the $700 billion dollar package into law.

President Bush said Friday he would quickly sign into law a far-reaching $700 billion bill to bailout the nation’s tottering financial industry and thanked Congress for acting in a bipartisan and decisive fashion.

“There were moments this week when some thought that the federal government could not rise to the challenge. But thanks to the hard work of members of both parties, in both houses, and the spirit of cooperation between Capitol Hill and my administration, we completed this bill in a timely manner,” Bush said in remarks in the Rose Garden.

Now that the feds have their obscene bailout package lets see if they can right the ship and get this country going again.

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The U.S. House of Representatives defeated a proposed bailout package of more than $700 billion dollars in a vote of 228-205. The stock market immediately took a nose dive with the Dow Jones dropping more than 700 points,  which is more than on 9/11.

In a stunning vote that shocked the capital and worldwide markets, the House on Monday defeated a $700 billion emergency rescue for the nation’s financial system, ignoring urgent warnings from President BushDow Jones industrials plunged nearly 800 points, the most ever for a single day. and congressional leaders of both parties that the economy could nosedive without it. The

Democratic and Republican leaders alike pledged to try again, though the Democrats said GOP lawmakers needed to provide more votes. Bush huddled with his economic advisers about a next step. The House was to reconvene on Thursday instead of adjourning for the year as planned.

The stock plunge began even before the 228-205 vote to reject the bill was officially announced on the House floor. The decline for the day surpassed the 721-point previous record, on the day after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, though in percentage terms it was well short of the drops on Black Monday of October 1987 and at the start of the Depression.

This is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point. Now that the markets are spooked about a looming disaster, any failure to pass this massive bailout will cause the looming disaster to happen for sure. It’s too bad the Democrats were not interested in regulating Fannie and Freddie back in 2004 when the Republicans wanted too. Now they have the chutzpah to blame this mess on so-called “Bush economic policies.”

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