I'd rather flush $700b than give it to Wall Street because if you give in to them now, it will just encourage them to demand more.
The bailout will not help your 401k in the long run. While you tighten your belt, the 22 thousand + employees of firms like Goldman Sachs make an average salary of over $500,000 each and that is even with all the salaries of people such as secretaries factored in!
Add all the megabonuses and golden parachutes to that and you can see where any profits will be going.
Wall Street has become a cadre of elite whose function is to siphon off the wealth of America and leave you with the coffee grounds. Paulson owns $500,000,000.00 worth of stock in that company.
This is why he refuses to cut executive payouts. He is only concerned with them, not with you.
Better that we demand responsibility and suffer a correction now, than to be slowly bled to death.