This New York Times article profiles some of the congressional lawmakers who were pressured to switch their vote from “no” to “yes” on the bailout bill. The first representative mentioned: Howard Coble, a Republican from North Carolina’s 6th district.
Why did Coble do a switcheroo? Well, a couple of reasons:
The bill was improved, Mr. Coble believed, by amendments that were adopted by the Senate on Wednesday. He welcomed an increase in the protection of bank deposits, raising the amount that can be insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to $250,000 per depositor per bank from $100,000. He was also swayed by the Senate?s addition of a tax provision, which will shield more than 20 million middle-income households from the alternative minimum tax, originally aimed at high-income people.
Among other provisions added in the Senate was a tax break for movie and television production companies that shoot films in the United States. While some lawmakers denounced this as a pet project, Mr. Coble said it was important to his state. The Civil War epic film ?Cold Mountain,? he recalled, may have been set in North Carolina but it was filmed in Romania.
The condensed version: there were some tempting local goodies in there that Coble couldn’t pass up. The question, of course, is whether these goodies justified pushing America over $10 trillion in debt.
The second reason:
…was in no small measure the torrent of telephone and e-mail that had swung in favor of the bill.
He [Coble] called the vote one of the most difficult he has ever cast. ?Half of my constituents will be annoyed with me, and half will be pleased,? he said.
It should be noted that Democrats Heath Shuler and Mike McIntyre stayed consistent and voted against the bailout plan a second time.
