Rep. Brad Sherman: Members of Congress told not passing a bailout bill would lead to martial law

In the first vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, U.S. Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, was one of the San Fernando Valley delegation's three holdouts.*

During a House floor speech on Tuesday, Oct. 2, which can be seen in the YouTube video above (found by me at BoingBoing), Sherman criticizes the way the bailout bill was sold to legislators. Specifically, he points to threats that the country would fall under martial law without the bill being passed. I'm not sure who was telling members of Congress that the Dow would drop thousands of points per day, and that martial law would be imposed, but he says that somebody was using these kind of threats to get lawmakers in line.

Here are Sherman's remarks:

"The only way they can pass this bill is by creating and sustaining a panic atmosphere. That atmosphere is not justified.

"Many of us were told in private conversations that if we voted against this bill, on Monday that the sky would fall, the market would drop 2,000 or 3,000 points the first day, another couple thousand the second day, and a few members were even told that there would be martial law in America if we voted no.

"That's what I call fear-mongering — unjustified, proven wrong. We've got a week, we've got two weeks to write a good bill. The only way to write, to pass a bad bill — keep the panic pressure on."

When the powers that be have to threaten the imposition of martial law, it makes the timeworn tradition of using earmarks to sweeten a bill and earn it votes look like the most civilized thing in the world.

In other words, I congratulate Rep. Sherman for hanging tough on this one. His formation of a self-described "skeptics caucus" and heightened media presence could signal his transformation from anonymous Valley congressman to perennial cable-news guest.

I first met Sherman many years ago when, as a member of the state Board of Equalization, he was fighting the snack tax. I always knew he had a little showboat in him, despite his accountant demeanor. This last vote won't endear him to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco. But it seems that he's lived down the JDate incident of 2005.

So, when it comes to the legislative aftermath of the mortgage-banking crisis, how big a role do you think Rep. Sherman will have?

* In the original vote, Reps. Howard Berman, D-Van Nuys, Henry Waxman, D-Los Angeles, Howard McKeon, R-Santa Clarita voted yes; Sherman, Elton Gallegly, R-Thousand Oaks and Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena voted no. On Friday, Oct. 3's second vote, Schiff voted yes, leaving Sherman and Gallegly as the area's two congressmen who voted no.