This Week on Capitol Hill

Congress had plans to head off for the campaign trail last Friday - but it'll stick around a couple days this week to try to greenlight what is - by all accounts - the nation's largest bailout in history. As long as they're there, lawmakers may also knock out some tax extensions, as well as bills on transportation and an India nuclear energy deal.

The financial rescue plan: After a roller-coaster week of negotiations and political theater, Congress is set to vote on a bailout bill (pdf) (see their one page primer) that House leaders hope to pass Monday - with the Senate following not far behind. The rescue plan would let the Fed buy up to $700 billion in mortgage-backed securities (the bum assets that've been sinking financial giants and putting the the market on edge) in an effort to keep Wall Street from dipping into a credit deep-freeze. As part of the negotiation, the deal would give Congress oversight of the rescue operation, in part by dividing the bailout into three installments, with the final one needing lawmakers' tacit okay. Other compromises would give tax payers stock in the companies they prop up, limit the size of CEO paychecks and golden parachutes and help out more families in defaulting mortgages.

Tax cut extensions: The House and Senate may blink in their game of chicken over extending popular tax cuts - including a middle-class cover from the Alternative Minimum Tax as well as R&D and alternative energy tax incentives for business. The two chambers both want to keep the $150 billion in tax perks alive; they disagree, however, on how to pay for them - with the House more eager to offset the cost of tax cuts elsewhere in the budget. The two sides are nudging closer to a deal, which they could pull off this week.

For good measure: While the Senate gets laid up in DC this week it may also okay an Amtrak and transportation safety bill as well as approve a nuclear energy deal with India.

If you want to let your Congressfolk know where you stand on any of the issues above, you can email them through Congress.org, because...

Hey, it's your democracy too.

- teamJoe

Next update: We'll check in with you after the election when Congress has a good chance of coming back for some lame duck action. Don't forget to vote!