Bailout Vote on Now

Daily Kos Staff

Monday September 29, 2008 · 10:46 AM PDT

2008/09/29 · 10:46

Twenty-eight Democrats came out to speak in support of the bill, 10 against. Eleven Republicans in favor, 26 against. Now, there's no reason to believe that that's in any particular way representative of those who didn't speak -- this is a self-selecting group who came to the floor. But if those numbers hold up across the parties, it's looking mighty tight.

That represents just under 74% of Dems who have come to the floor speaking in support. 74% of the 235 Dems in the House would be 173 votes. Eleven of 37 Republicans = just under 30% of Republicans. That'd be 59 Republican votes, for a total of 232 votes, enough for passage, with room to spare.

We'll see what the wallflowers have to say when it's time to cast those votes. Which is... right now.

The more likely outcome, it now occurs to me, is that if the bill passes, it'll be with closer to the narrowest possible majority. I imagine that Members who are unenthusiastic about this bill will wait until the last possible moment, to see whether their votes are necessary or not. And with a minute to go in the 15 allotted for the vote, some 86 Members are hanging back.

And as time expires on the vote, a narrow majority oppose it, with 192 voting yea and 213 voting nay.

They can hold this vote open for a while to twist arms if they think they can get to a win.

Now a full-on majority in opposition as the dam breaks. 199-223. Members are hollering for "regular order," meaning they want the vote closed.

This is too many votes for them to twist arms for, I think. Depends on how many Members have fled the floor so they can't be found for pressuring.

No votes have changed for quite some time now. They look to be stuck at 205, but haven't brought the gavel down yet.

Found one! 206. Two! 207.

Looks like the wallflowers stayed away from the debate because they were voting no and didn't want to be pressured, as opposed to voting yes and not wanting to go on TV and admit it.

Several commenters have noted the Dow's reaction. It's yo-yoing a bit, but sitting at about 500 down for the day at the moment.

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