Excellent circumlocution, Ryan. Sounded just like Obama in defending his TARP vote.
Neither man was necessarily wrong about the TARP. What was wrong about the chain of decisions made over the preceding 18 months which led to the near collapse of the banking system. As a stopgap, it may have been necessary, but then Obama began using this reserve as a kind of slush fund for all kinds of stuff. Not so sure about these founding principle things. Hamilton’s national bank was not foreseen by the Constitutional Convention, which was why Madison broke with his erstwhile ally over the issue. Madison would have won if Jefferson had not brokered a deal. Short term, Hamilton’s plan was a good fix, but then we seen speculators gaming the system to make a ton of money/going broke. Jefferson was soon aghast at what he had done and began working to correct his mistake. Our Founders were great men, but even Ted Williams only hit over .400 for a single year.