As a substitute for real, informed discussion of issues I often see people arguing against the metaphor that has been, rightly or wrongly, used as a surrogate. Real facts and important distinctions that don't fit the methaphor are quick to be discarded as those battling over the metaphor quickly overwhelm those with a deeper and more grounded understanding of the issues.
I don't like the idea of bailing out wallstreet. The metaphor is that due to their own mismanagement and greed their boat is sinking at a rather alarming rate. The major problem with this metaphor is we are all in the boat together because we all share the same economy. Sure, in many ways there are a lot of people on wallstreet that were acting irresponsibly but the problems they have caused are not their's alone.
A better way of thinking of the situation is our economy has been in a bad accident. There are lots of victims, some who are innocent and others that aren't. Do we try and figure out who is to blame and let those people die or do we try and save everyone and sort out the blame later? Do we just save the important people and let the less important people suffer?
In my opinion the adult thing to do is stablize the economy (and by that I mean both Wall Street and Main Street) and then later we need to look at the causes and what can be done to prevent a similar situation. Don't try and do too much now as time is of the essence and we don't really know enough to fix everything now. Later we must take the time to consider what the costs where and how we can best make those responsible bear them.
The real risk in my opinion is that people will believe the bailout metaphor and then think that once disaster has been averted there won't be that much left to do. They will be caught in the fantasy of the erroneous metaphor when in reality things aren't going to be fine. Recovery will take some time, surely measured in years not months and the hardest work will remain to be done.