The pen is mightier. Too mighty, in fact..

You know how if you see something over and over it eventually becomes so common you stop acknowledging it? Well, when it comes to zeroes behind digits on handouts to people who have no business expecting anything, politicians have that same issue:

The financial world was fixated on Capitol Hill as Congress battled over the Bush administration's request for a $700 billion bailout of the banking industry. In the midst of this late-September drama, the Treasury Department issued a five-sentence notice that attracted almost no public attention.

But corporate tax lawyers quickly realized the enormous implications of the document: Administration officials had just given American banks a windfall of as much as $140 billion.

The sweeping change to two decades of tax policy escaped the notice of lawmakers for several days, as they remained consumed with the controversial bailout bill. When they found out, some legislators were furious. Some congressional staff members have privately concluded that the notice was illegal. But they have worried that saying so publicly could unravel several recent bank mergers made possible by the change and send the economy into an even deeper tailspin. (emphasis mine)

Short document, huge payoff...

Just to put this in perspective, here's a list of what $140,000,000,000 could buy:

According to musiciansfriend.com, a MiniMoog Voyager synthesizer & MPC-5000 drum machine for the entire population of Texas.
Over 5 million Mac Pro computers with literally EVERY option and upgrade pre-installed. Seriously, go try it.
Enough philly cheesesteaks from Geno's for the entire population of Angola to have one, each meal, three meals a day, for a year.
30 million bottles of really #%$*ing luxurious cognac.
Enough Katana swords for the entire population of Russia to go all Kill Bill on each other -- with change left over.

It took me longer to find all that out and write this than it did for the US government to shift that much money to banks. As for why these odd figures, I find that dorking out on statistics like that keeps me calm enough to not break stuff.

(cross-posted to Psychopolitik)

This would be one of those moments when the government proves to actually be too powerful for itself.

I haven't dug enough to see if these two things are related, but they sound similar...

Fed won’t give info on nearly $2 trillion in loans | Front page | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

I would place the emphasis on the semi-secrecy of this policy change.

From your article;

But lawmakers worried about discussing their concerns publicly. The staff of Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the Finance Committee, had asked that the entire conference call be kept secret, according to a person with knowledge of the call.

From my article:

Banks oppose any release of information because it might signal weakness and spur short-selling or a run by depositors, said Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government affairs for the Financial Services Roundtable, a Washington trade group.
“You have to balance the need for transparency with protecting the public interest,” Talbott said. “Taxpayers have a right to know where their tax dollars are going, but one piece of information standing alone could undermine public confidence in the system.”

My interpretation: the system is fraudulent, and cannot be maintained without secrecy.

Rothbard never sounded so reasonable:

The very idea of "deposit insurance" is a swindle; how does one insure an institution (fractional reserve banking) that is inherently insolvent, and which will fall apart whenever the public finally understands the swindle?