Well, maybe not down in flames, but it got shot down regardless in the House. Shame, too. McCain didn’t even get a chance to skip the vote. Maybe that explains why the Republicans didn’t go for it. Actually that’s a little unfair, the vote was pretty evenly split.

The vote was 228-205 against the measure, with one member not voting, half an hour after voting began. Voting remains open even though the “official” time has expired for casting a ballot.

There was broad bipartisan opposition to the measure, with more than 90 Democrats and more than 130 Republicans voting against the bill. Republicans voted more than 2-1 to oppose the bill.

The vote came even though the measure was backed by Bush and House leaders in both parties. But opponents said the package granted the U.S. government too much power and and was beyond the cost the government should pay to address the worldwide financial crisis.

Wall Street reacted immediately to the news. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by more than 700 points as the outcome became known, then settled near a 450-point loss.

That’s actually a really odd situation. The party leaders all seemed to like the bill and it had the president’s support. It’s not often that a bill of this magnitude still gets rejected even after a consensus seems to be found in the party brass.

Maybe it’s for the best, if Michael Moore’s take is anything to go by (and yes, I consider Moore, for all his inflammatory rhetoric, a more than reliable source of commentary):

It has everything to do with it. This so-called “collapse” was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with people’s home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it’s because too many working class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn’t afford. Here’s the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because of medical bills. Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health coverage, this mortgage “crisis” may never have happened.

This bailout’s mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It’s to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It’s to make sure their yachts and mansions and “way of life” go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars!

Hm.