Today at Talk Radio News Service

Bureau Chief Ellen Ratner and Legal Affairs Correspondent Jay Tamboli will be reporting on the Presidential Debate in Nashville, Tenn.

White House Correspondent Lovisa Frost will be covering the President’s remarks on the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act in Chantilly, Va.

Pentagon Correspondent S. Dawn Casey will be reporting from the Pentagon.

The Washington Bureau will be covering the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on the AIG bailout, remarks by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman and Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer on the release of National Biofuels Action Plan, a discussion on the function of the Electoral College at the National Archives, and the National Research Council’s briefing on protecting individual privacy in the struggle against terrorists.

The Washington Bureau will also be covering a National Press Club luncheon with artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude on the art project "The Mastaba" for the United Arab Emirates and the Energy Deparment’s 2008-2009 Winter Fuels Outlook Conference.

White House Briefing

Following the president's statement in the Rose Garden, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino and Director of the National Economic Council briefed the press on the government's increasing role in attempting to restore investor confidence to the struggling financial markets.

Hennessey outlined the steps that have been taken and those that the government would like to happen, "So we've got the conservatorship for Fannie and Freddie. Treasury and Fed worked over the last weekend, they were up in New York working with firms in the industry," he said. "We had the Fed taking steps just a couple days ago to prevent what they would call the disorderly liquidation of AIG, the insurance company. And then the Fed has been increasing significant amounts of liquidity into the financial system to keep things moving."

Hennessey reiterated statements made by President Bush about urging the Congress to pass legislation that would allow the federal government to buy illiquid assets from struggling financial institutions to further increase liquidity.

"The most obvious example of an illiquid asset is a mortgage asset, a mortgage-backed security that's probably lost value as the values of the homes that are underlying those mortgages have declined," he said. "And what's happening is, as those assets have lost value, people don't want to buy them, they become illiquid, it's hard for people to buy and sell them, and so they're stuck on the balance sheets of financial institutions."

Hennessey said that the White House would be in negotiation with congressional leaders over the weekend. Congress and the administration will need to hammer out the details of this authorizing legislation. Hennessey said that they would have to make "significant, substantive progress on the details" over the weekend.

"This is a very bold set of actions, we are calling on Congress to do something that is very big and that we believe needs to be done quickly," he said.

GOP wants Obama position on AIG bailout

"He has no credibility in his promises," said Senior Policy Advisor of the McCain-Palin 2008 campaign, Doug Holtz-Eakin during a conference call today, discussing Barack Obama's economic leadership. According to Holtz, Obama voted 94 times for higher taxes in the Senate but suddenly changing his opinion saying that he will only raise tax barriers for people with higher income. Holtz said that McCain on the other hand have studied the current economic crisis closely.

According to Rep. Eric Cantor (R-V.Wa.), Obama has not made a clear stand point on the insurance company American International Group (AIG) latest financial difficulties. Cantor said that McCain believes this is a extreme situation and does not want to put American taxpayers money into privately owned industries that are faltering, but believes this will protect taxpayers dollars in the end.

"This is a loan to AIG, not a bailout," said Cantor.

"This is an election that will be decided based upon leadership," said Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) According to Burr, Obama is taking no position on what needs to be done to address issues similar to the government assistance of AIG. Burr said that Obama needs to take a stance because of the financial sector's major impact on Americans as employees and customers.

Capitol Hill reacts to government bailouts

The Hill is still reeling from Department of Treasury and Federal Reserve market interventions in the hard hit financial section.

"Enough is enough...We've got to bailout the taxpayer from bailout mania," said Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas). Hensarling and other House Republicans spoke out against government intervention in the market, including the recent government assistance of Bear Sterns, AIG and the takeover of government sponsored enterprises Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Hensarling, along with Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Michelle Bachman (R-Minn.), Tom Price (R-Ga.), Scott Garrett (R-NJ), and Tom Feeney (R-Fl.)

"The government is the lender of last resort," said Price. He said that risk is an inherent part of the free market system. Price and Feeney emphasized their view that the government is socializing risk as profits are kept private. The recent moves to facilitate sales and give loans to struggling financial giants by the Treasury Department are expected to add to the long term debt to be absorbed by the tax payer. "Again we believe that any short term gain by bailing out one another financial institution is not worth the long term pain of the moral hazard of taking us...to a lost decade of economic growth," said Hensarling.

Following a press conference to highlight recipients of certain government assistance programs like the Children's Health Insurance Program and the Low Income Energy Assistance Program, Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D- Md.) addressed the bailout of American International Group.

Reid, the Senate majority leader, decried "secret meetings" between Congress and the administration to lay out government assistance measures. "I think it's time that there's more than one branch of government. The American people deserve some transparency." Reid said that he believed that the Senate could do something to stabilize the economy by passing a bill to fund infrastructure before the current session comes to an end.

Hoyer said that there would be hearings in both the Financial Services and Oversight committees. He said that Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) would look into the future of regulations and that Oversight Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) would investigate what happened to lead up to these government bailouts. Hoyer said that committee would answer the questions "What went wrong? Why did we not regulate? Why did we not have the referee on the field?"