The Naughty List
Religion & Liberty Online

The Naughty List

You can view the most recent list of those companies that have received bailout assistance from the federal government via the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (EESA), executed through measures like the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), here (PDF updated 12/16/08).

I’m thinking about adding these companies to my own personal “naughty” list.

Visit the EESA homepage, where you can sign up for EESA e-mail updates as your tax dollars are spent for you. “How is this money being spent?” you might ask. Well, in the interest of full disclosure, the government has not required any special reporting for how the bailees are using these funds.

Remember that rush to push the bailout through right before the election, when the government and the media were telling us that Congress needed to hurry up and authorize the use of more money than has been spent on the entire Iraq war? The legislation appears to be so sloppy that it allows the executive branch to distribute the funds as it pleases, without any accountability for how the funds are being spent, and without any restrictions on what sort of industry qualifies.

I guess it’s more important that the money gets spent rather than how it gets spent.

Since government is now in the business of rewarding failure (call it a “demeritocracy”), nominate those most deserving of money from the bailout in the comment boxes below. Here’s a list to get you started:

Jordan J. Ballor

Jordan J. Ballor (Dr. theol., University of Zurich; Ph.D., Calvin Theological Seminary) is director of research at the Center for Religion, Culture & Democracy, an initiative of the First Liberty Institute. He has previously held research positions at the Acton Institute and Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, and has authored multiple books, including a forthcoming introduction to the public theology of Abraham Kuyper. Working with Lexham Press, he served as a general editor for the 12 volume Abraham Kuyper Collected Works in Public Theology series, and his research can be found in publications including Journal of Markets & Morality, Journal of Religion, Scottish Journal of Theology, Reformation & Renaissance Review, Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Faith & Economics, and Calvin Theological Journal. He is also associate director of the Junius Institute for Digital Reformation Research at Calvin Theological Seminary and the Henry Institute for the Study of Christianity & Politics at Calvin University.